" PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS 



IN 



HEAVENLY PLACES." 



1 



flU^J&tZ, &^<4*Zt {/S/L-e****^ 

"PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS 

IN 

HEAVENLY PLACES." 

BY 

CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH. 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION, 



BY THE 

REV. EDWARD BICKERSTETH. 



NEW-YORK: 
PUBLISHED BY JOHN S. TAYLOR & CO. 

AT THE NEW YORK SUNDAY SCHOOL AND JUVENILE BOOK DEPOSITORY, 

Brick Church Chapel, 145 Nassau-Street. 

1842. 



TO THE INTENT THAT NOW UNTO THE PRINCIPALITIES AND 
POWERS IN HEAVENLY PLACES MIGHT BE KNOWN BY THE 
CHURCH THE MANIFOLD WISDOM OF GOD. — EPHES. III. 10. 

WE WRESTLE NOT AGAINST FLESH AND BLOOD, BUT AGAINST 
PRINCIPALITIES, AGAINST POWERS, AGAINST THE RULERS 
OF THE DARKNESS OF THIS WORLD, AGATNST SPIRITUAL 
WICKEDNESS IN HIGH PLACES. — EPHES. VI. 12. 

HAVING SPOILED PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS, HE MADE A 
SHEW OF THEM OPENLY, TRIUMPHING OVER THEM. — CO- 
LOSSIANS II. 15. 



1* 



CONTENTS. 



PART I. 
OF EVIL SPIRITS. 

Page 



Section I. — Their Existence and Character, ... 13 

II. — The power and employment of Evil 

Spirits, 22 

III. — Satanic Daring, 34 

IV. — Satanic Cunning, 46 

V. — Satanic Cruelty, 58 

VI. — Satanic Activity, 72 

VII. — Satanic Knowledge, 81 

VilL — The limit of Satanic Power, .... 89 

IX. — Satanic Wrath as the end draws nigh, 102 

X. — The Doom of Satan and his Angels, . 119 



VHL 



CONTENTS. 



PART II. 
OF THE HOLY ANGELS. 

Page 



Section 1. — Their Existence and Character, . . . 127 

II. — Angelic Knowledge and Power, . .. . 136 

III. — Angelic Obedience, 150 

IV. — Angelic Ministry, . 163 

V. — Angelic Sympathy, 182 

VI. — Angelic interest in the Jewish people, . 202 

VII. — Christ seen of Angels, 218 

VIII. — The Apostles a spectacle to Angels, . 239 

IX. — Angelic Ministrations in the last days, 251 

X. — Angelic Triumph, . 266 

CONCLUSION. 

Cheist the King of Angels, 272 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



I have great pleasure in complying with a request to 
prefix a few introductory words to this work. I think 
it scriptural, seasonable, and practical. No part of di- 
vine truth can be neglected without spiritual loss, and 
it is too evident that the deep and mysterious doctrine 
of Revelation respecting evil spirits and good angels, 
has been far too much disregarded in our age. This 
has arisen — on the one hand from the wide spread of 
infidel principles, and on the other from the unscrip- 
tural, idolatrous, extravagant attention paid to this sub- 
ject in the Church of Rome, in which the good angels 
are worshipped, and the evil spirits brought forward to 
foster delusions. But we gain no solid victory over 
Popery, by omitting the truths which have been cor- 
rupted and abused. Our duty is rather to take forth 



X 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



the precious from the vile, and hold fast the simple and 
plain truth revealed for us and our children ; thus shall 
we be as God's mouth to his people. Jer. xv. 10. 

The friend who wrote this work has been careful not 
to go beyond the divine record, and to rest every thing 
here stated on her own personal investigation of the 
words of the Most High. The reader will find it an 
edifying and appropriate work, bringing out plainly and 
perspicuously the scriptural testimony on the subject on 
which it treats ; and I believe it to be specially suited 
to meet a want actually existing in the Church of Christ 
at this time. 

There is an advantage in some respects in one 
mind, simply drawing its sentiments and conclusions 
from the Scriptures only, without the aid of any other 
mind ; and this advantage the Reader will have in 
this work. It gives not that fulness of truth, which 
the communion of many minds gives, but we obtain 
by it more of the simplicity and plainness of the Scrip- 
ture testimony. 

Looking at the signs of the times, and the long neg- 
lect and unnatural denial of all angelic ministration or 
spiritual influence, and at the express predictions of 
false Christs and false prophets, who shall shew signs 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



xi 



and wonders, insomuch that if it ivere possible they 
should deceive the very elect, and that when men receive 
not the love of the truth that they might be saved, for 
this cause God shall send them strong delusion that they 
shoidd believe a lie, I cannot but think there is a painful 
prospect of a sudden recoil and religious revulsion from 
the present unbelief and misbelief, to an unnatural and 
undistinguishing credulity, when Antichrist shall ap- 
pear in his latest form, " with signs and lying wonders." 
I would therefore leave an earnest caution on the minds 
of my readers — Beloved, believe not every spirit, but 
try the spirits, whether they are of God. The Scrip- 
tures have forewarned us beforehand, that we may not 
be led away with the error of the ivicked, and fall from 
our own stedfastness. 

My hope is that this work may tend much to in- 
crease the watchfulness, call forth the prayers, strength- 
en the faith, enliven the hopes, and cheer the hearts of 
Christians, contending with our mighty spiritual ene- 
mies, and succoured by those yet mightier angels who 
are ministering spirits to the heirs of Salvation. In the 
increasing intenseness of the conflict, we shall probably 
soon more urgently need every aid of this kind. May 
it please God thus to assist many in attaining that final 



XII INTRODUCTORY REMARXS. 

victory which is sure to every faithful follower of Christ, 
for " He that is in us is stronger than he that is in the 
world." 

Edward Bickersteth. 

Walton, Herts, July 19, 1842, 



PART I. 



OF EVIL SPIRITS. 



SECTION I. — THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. ■ 

The eternal power and godhead of the Most High, are, 
as St. Paul tells us, invisible things, yet clearly seen 
and to be understood even of the heathen, by those things 
which he hath made. Rom. i. 20. The order and har- 
mony of creation, the wonderful manner in which all 
things are upheld, preserved, perpetuated, or reproduced, 
appeal to the natural reason and conscience of man, be- 
speaking some mighty, creative, over-ruling hand, di- 
rected by a wisdom and knowledge to which no mortal 
may attain. And this recognition is all but universal. 
However false, however distorted, however debased by 
the most wretched folly, superstition and crime, we find 
the principle of Deism in some form established through- 
out the world. 

But beyond this, man cannot go ; he sees that God 
is powerful, and if the desperate wickedness of his own 
2 



14 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



heart did not blind it, he must also perceive that God 
is good ; giving us rain and fruitful seasons, filling our 
hearts with food and gladness, clothing the earth with 
refreshing verdure ; decking it with myriads of glowing 
flowers ; bestowing on the birds their soft and graceful 
plumage, bright in lovely dyes, and teaching them to 
breathe forth music from their cheei ful throats : causing 
the moon to walk in brightness, the stars to spangle 
heaven, and peopling even the little brooks that run 
among the hills with unnumbered forms of beauty that 
sport in the pure element. So far, man may recognise 
God, may lovo, fear, and praise him. 

But beyond this we have no means of penetrating ; 
our bodily organs appear to be the sole medium of com- 
munication with what exists. What we can see, hear, 
feel, smell, or taste, is matter of observance, affording 
evidence on which the mind may rely, and from it we 
may reason or conjecture to any extent, but can know 
nothing to bring us acquainted with what lies beyond 
the range of our senses, we need a special revelation 
from Him who governs all, and this revelation we 
possess. Between the two covers of a book that a child 
may grasp, we find all that is needful or profitable for 
us to know of the nature, attribute, and works of the 
Almighty, of his power in creation, his love in redemp- 
tion, his past dealings with the world, and his future 
purposes respecting it. By the comparatively dim twi- 
light of his works we may feel after, and haply find 
him, as the all-presiding governor of the world which 
he has made : in the bright blaze of his word we be- 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 15 

hold him distinctly ; and not only Him, but a race of 
intermediate beings, different from ourselves in that 
they are not burdened with flesh, possessed of faculties 
and powers that give them a vast advantage over us, 
and deeply interested, busily employed about us who 
are naturally wholly regardless, even when not wholly 
ignorant concerning them. 

Of these mysterious beings we know the number is 
immensely great ; and that they are divided into two 
classes : the " elect angels," " holy angels," who are 
God's obedient ministers and do his pleasure ; and 
" the angels which kept not their first estate, but left 
their own habitation," (Jude 6,) who are rebels against 
God, and implacable enemies to man. These last are 
marshalled under one superior chief, who directs their 
operations, and maintains, with their assistance, a king- 
dom upon earth, directly opposed to the government of 
Christ the rightful King. To support by every possible 
means, to extend and to strengthen this usurped do- 
minion, to seduce all whom he can, to terrify others, 
and to thwart, harass, and distress every child of God 
while sojourning here, is the object of the adversary. 
His very name, Satan, expresses it ; and the superior 
power which as a spirit he possesses, becomes effectual 
in carrying out his most malevolent designs, whenever 
the omnipotence of God does not interpose to restrain it. 

But assertion, on a subject of such tremendous mo- 
ment to every individual of the human race, will not 
suffice : we must have proof— such proof as God alone 
can afford us means of obtaining ; and which where it 



16 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



exists he must also enable us to perceive, for the policy 
of Satan is wholly opposed to the inquiry. There is 
nothing he dreads so much as our being " not ignorant 
of his devices," because he knows that where it is re- 
vealed to us, " We wrestle not against flesh and blood, 
but against principalities, against powers, against the ru- 
lers of the darkness of this world, against wicked spirits 
in high places." Eph. vi. 12. In the preceding verse 
we are also told of a sure defence, and exhorted " Put 
on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to 
stand against the wiles of the Devil." And despite 
the express declarations of God's word, despite its re- 
iterated warnings, despite even our own sore personal 
experience of his craft and subtlety, we are prone to 
overlook not only such testimony to his continual ac- 
tivity and abundant means of warning against us, but 
the very fact of his existence, so far as it concerns the 
daily experience, collectively and individually, of the 
Church of Christ. 

Strange as this may sound, it is undeniable : we can- 
not marvel that where Satan, "the god of this world, 
hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest 
the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the 
image of God, should shine unto them," (2 Cor. iv. 4,) 
he should have taken care also to blind them to his own 
devices ; that he should have stealthily thrown the ban- 
dage across their eyes from behind, so tha't they know 
not the hand which performed the operation, not even 
that such operation is performed ; but it is wonderful 
that he can prevail upon Christian people to banish his 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 17 



name, as they generally do, from their daily converse, 
and Christian pastors to make only, now and then, a 
slight incidental reference to it in the pulpit ; and in 
these days, too, while in every department of our house- 
holds, in every street of our cities, in Church and State, 
in cottage and palace, at home and abroad, he is inces- 
santly manifesting his hateful presence, perplexing, se- 
ducing, embroiling, dismaying, uprooting, and disorgan- 
izing, till the whole framework of society is loosened, 
and ready upon the first shock to crumble about us. 

It cannot be unseasonable, at any period, far less at 
this juncture, to draw the attention of Christians to a 
point which God has seen fit to represent as of the most 
stirring, vital importance to them. The warning needs 
to be often sounded, " Be sober, be vigilant, because 
your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion walketh about, 
seeking whom he may devour." (1 Peter, v. 8.) But 
in treating of a matter so exceedingly solemn and awful, 
care must be taken not to run into the opposite danger 
of saying too much. We must "not go beyond the 
word of the Lord to speak more nor less." G reat mis- 
chief has been done^ and by great men too, by indul- 
ging imagination and. building unreal fabrics on the 
solid foundation of the revealed fact. Scripture alone 
must speak, in declaring the existence, personality, 
characters, offices, and positive actings of those spiritual - 
creatures, which constantly surround us, beginning with 
Satan and his angels. May He, who by death destroyed 
him that had the power of death ; He, the seed of the 
woman, who came to bruise the serpent's head ; He, 



lb 



OF evil spirits: 



who led captivity captive, and who will bruise Satan 
under our feet shortly : may He, even the Lord Jesus 
Christ, bless this humble attempt, preserving both the 
writer and the reader from all presumptuous sin ! 

Before proceeding to examine the truth concerning 
Satan, we must notice the false impressions current both 
as to his person and employment. We are taught from 
the nursery to regard him as a hideous, disgusting, and 
almost ludicrously contemptible object. A black, mis- 
shapen, half-human body, with limbs and other appen- 
dages belonging to various classes of animals, an exces- 
sively frightful, grinning face, and, in short, a prepos- 
terous compound of all that is ugly and incongruous, 
supply the general idea of the " Prince of this world." 
This fabulous image bears the marks of his own crea- 
tion, for it is calculated to throw us off our guard by 
masking his real importance, so that we grow up ashamed 
of having once been frightened by these pictures of the 
devil, and count it a mark of matured reason to laugh 
at the hobgoblin of our childhood. His name, too, is 
linked with mean and ridiculous associations ; it is de- 
nounced as a vulgarism, and when plainly uttered in 
conversation with a reference to his works, a smile of 
levity, if not a grave reproof, usually awaits the offend- 
er. A variety of nicknames have been applied to him, 
the substitution of which, for his scriptural title is con- 
sidered as showing greater respect for the auditors, 
and greater refinement in the speaker; and he has 
been so identified with the most flippant, most trifling 
or profane forms of speech* even among polished gen- 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 19 

tlemen, that one of the hardest tasks the awakened 
Christian has to encounter is, to disconnect the name 
of the devil from such associations, and to dissuade 
others so offending. 

As regards his works, a still more dangerous mistake 
seems to prevail : he is looked on by the professing 
world in general as little more than a chimerical person- 
age ; one who, when our Lord was on earth, proved 
busy, and troublesome to him, but who is mostly in 
hell, tormenting such as he has got into his power, and 
rarely, if ever, interfering with the course of this world. 
Sometimes the most petty annoyances, and vexatious 
little mistakes are referred to his mischievous arrange- 
ments, but more through momentary petulance than 
any sober conviction : at other times, he is represented 
as presiding where very extensive injury is done, per- 
haps directing the campaigns of a Napoleon, or baffling 
some scheme of universal philanthropy. But to regard 
him as systematically busying himself in the concerns 
of individuals, more particularly as influencing, by his 
artful suggestion, their words and deeds, is looked on 
as most childishly superstitious. Nay, even among spi- 
ritual persons there is a lurking unbelief on this subject, 
which gives the enemy many an advantage over them. 
They are loth to believe that when engaged in promot- 
ing a good work, Satan is at their right hand, resisting 
them : that, by his whispered suggestions, their humil- 
ity is often depressed into cowardice, their zeal quick- 
ened to rashness, their confidence urged on to presump- 
tion, and their prudence chilled with unbelief. In 



20 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



whatsoever quality the Lord has enabled them to excel, 
that very excellence Satan will weave' a snare for their 
feet ; and the snare once laid, he has abundant agen- 
cies at work to draw, or drive them into it. Theoreti- 
cally, perhaps, this is not denied, but point out a living 
instance of such delusion, and you are presently re- 
proved or frowned into silence. 

The following direct testimonies from the scriptures 
to the existence and character of evil spirits, of whom 
one distinct chief or leader controls a number of subor- 
dinate devils, will establish. our first point: — 

•'And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, 
called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole 
world : he was cast out into the earth, and his angels 
were cast out with him, " Rev. xii. 9. 

" Ye are of your father the devil, and the Justs of 
your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the 
beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is 
no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh 
of his own : for he is a liar, and the father of it. John 
viii. 44. 

"But some of them, said, He casteth out devils 
through Beelzebub the chief of the devils." Luke xi. 15. 

" If Satan be divided against himself, how shall his 
kingdom stand? because ye say that I cast out devils 
through Beelzebub." v. IS. 

" Thou believest that there is one God ; thou doest 
well ; the devils also believe, and tremble." James 
ii. 19. 

" He said unto him, come out of the man, thou, un 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 21 



clean spirit ; and he asked him, what is thy name ; 
And he answered, saying, my name is Legion ; for we 
are many." Mark v. 8, 9. 

"Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, pre- 
pared for the devil and his angels." Matt. xxv. 41. 

" God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast 
them down to hell." 2 Peter ii. 4. 

These form but a small portion of the inspired decla- 
rations which might be adduced under this head, yet 
they suffice to place the fact beyond a cavil, and our 
next step is to ascertain the extent of power possessed 
by Satan ; and the habitual employment of the infernal 
hosts. 



22 



OF EVIL SPIRITS I 



SECTION II. — THE POWER AND EMPLOYMENT OF 
EVIL SPIRITS. 

Always bearing in mind that our discoveries of things 
unseen must be limited by the plain declarations of 
God's word, we shall find it very difficult to fix the pre- 
cise bounds of Satan's power and authority. That he 
possesses vast influence over man in his fallen state is 
very plain. Our Lord repeatedly calls him "the prince 
of this world." " Now shall the prince of this world 
be cast out." John xii. 31. " The prince of this world 
cometh, and hath nothing in me." xiv. 30. " The prince 
of this world is judged." xvi. 11. St. Paul speaks of 
him as " the god of this world." 2 Cor. iv. 4 ; and as 
"the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now 
worketh in the children of disobedience." Eph. ii. 2. 
Considering how deliberately our first parents cast off 
their allegiance to God at the bidding of Satan, and by 
so doing, virtually transferred it to him, we may suppose 
his acquired dominion to be exceedingly great : insomuch 
that when earth's rightful Lord first came, in great hu- 
mility, to make reconciliation for that iniquity of his 
creature, man, Satan, exhibiting all the kingdoms of the 
world, could utter that fearful boast, " All this power 
will I give thee, and the glory of them : for that is deliv- 
ered unto me; and to whomsoever I will, I give it." 
Luke iv. 6. His triumphant vaunt indeed was of short 
duration ; for He, whom he dared to tempt, speedily 
cast him out of his earthly possessions, and stripped 



THEIR POWER AND EMPLOYMENT. 



23 



him too, of a more terrible perogative : for the Son of 
God became partaker of flesh and blood, " that through 
death he might destroy him that had the power of death, 
that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of 
death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." Heb. 
ii. 14, 15. 

But beyond this, there is something that we cannot 
fathom : Satan is represented to us occasionally in situa- 
tions far higher than a mere ruler of all the kingdoms of 
our earth could aspire to. Glympses of a mysterious 
freedom of access to heavenly places are now and then 
afforded us ; and though men have undertaken to explain 
away by a system of types and figures what our en- 
feebled intellect cannot grasp, still we have the plain 
declarations of God's word, which it would be our higher 
wisdom to receive in its obvious meaning ; and where 
we cannot comprehend, to lay our mouths in the dust, 
and silently adore. 

The first of these instances occurs in the history of 
Job ; where it is said, " Now there was a day when the 
sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, 
and Satan came also among them. And the Lord said 
unto Satan, whence comest thou? Then Satan an- 
swered the Lord, and said, From going to and fro in 
the earth, and from walking up and down in it." Job i. 
6, 7, and ii. 1, 2. This occurs twice. Again, Zecha- 
riah says, "And he shewed me, Joshua, the high priest, 
standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan stand- 
ing at his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said 
unto Satan, The Lord rebuke thee, 0 Satan ; even the 



24 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not 
this a brand plucked out of the fire !" Zech. iii. 1, 2. 
Perfectly consistent with these views is the language of 
the Apocalypse ; in a passage bearing so emphatically 
on our subject, that it must be given entire. "And 
there was war in heaven : Michael and his angels fought 
against the dragon ; and the dragon fought, and his an- 
gels ; and prevailed not : neither was their place found 
any more in heaven. And the great dragon w 7 as cast 
out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which 
deceiveth the whole world : he was cast out into the 
earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And I 
heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come sal- 
vation and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and 
the power of his Christ : for the accuser of our brethren 
is cast down, which accused them before God, day and 
night. And they overcame him by the blood of the 
Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they 
loved not their lives unto the death. Therefore rejoice, 
ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the in- 
habitants of the earth, and of the sea ; for the Devil is 
come down unto you, having great wrath, because he 
knoweth that he hath but a short time." Rev. xii. 7 — 
12. Whatever, and whenever this casting out may be, 
it does not appear to have taken place in Paul's time ; 
for in writing to the Ephesians, he says, "We wrestle 
not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, 
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of 
this world, against wicked spirits in heavenly places." 
Eph. vi. 12. So reads the margin of our authorized 



THEIH POWER AND E3IPLOYMENT. 



25 



version ; and Wiclif, in 1380, translates it, "iVgens spi- 
ritual thingis of wickednesse in hewinli thingis." The 
Geneva version, 1557, has it, "Against spiritual wick- 
ednesses which are above;" and the Rhemish, 1582, 
"Against the spirituals of wickedness in the celestials." 
In this, as in other instances, a growing dimness of vis- 
ion on our mysterious and awful subject, has perhaps 
biased both translators and commentators, to put a 
gloss on what they cannot easily reconcile with their 
established systems. There is yet another very remark- 
able passage belonging to this head. In the book of 
Daniel, we find a heavenly instructer coming to show 
the prophet what shall befall his people, the Jews, in the 
latter days, who thus expresses himself: "The prince 
of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty 
days ; but lo, Michael, one of the chief princes, came 
to help me." Dan. x. 13. And again he says, "Now 
will I return to fight with the prince of Persia ; and 
when I am gone forth, the prince of Grecia shall come 

and there is none that holdeth with me in these 

things, but Michael your prince." Dan. x. 20, 21. It 
is not to be supposed that mere mortal kings were thus 
enabled to resist angels : we can but understand it of a 
certain authority exercised by these wicked spirits, these 
principalities, and powers, and rulers of the darkness of 
this world, over nations that, in the practice of idola- 
trous abominations sacrificed unto devils, as the Apostle 
declares. We build no theory on these extraordinary 
declarations of the Most High : we merely point them 



3 



26 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



out, and endeavour to show how they harmonize with 
other parts of the same immutable word. 

Micaiah's vision is also observable. When adjured 
by the king to declare the truth of what the Lord had 
revealed concerning his projected enterprise, he thus 
disclosed it:— "I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, 
and all the host of heaven standing by him, on his right 
hand and on his left. And the Lord said, Who shall 
persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth 
Gilead? And one said on this manner, and another 
said on that manner. And there came forth a spirit, 
and stood before the Lord, and said, I will persuade 
him. And the Lord said unto him, Wherewith? And 
he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the 
mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Thou shalt 
persuade him, and prevail also : go forth and do so." 
1 Kings xxii. 19 — 22. This is repeated with scarcely 
any verbal variation in 2 Chron. xviii. 18 — 21. We can- 
not suppose the prophet of the Lord was at liberty to 
invent a fiction concerning the inhabitants of heaven ; 
more especially as his warning was exactly fulfilled : 
neither can we reasonably suppose that a holy angel 
would volunteer to become a lying spirit, to mislead a 
sinner to his final ruin. The doom of Ahab had long 
been fixed : dogs were to lick his blood in the place 
where the innocent blood of the murdered Naboth had 
flowed ; and his obstinate determination of going up to 
battle to Ramoth Gilead was the means of its fulfilment. 
Still he was warned : the conscientious Jehosophat 
would not be satisfied unless a true prophet of the Lord 



THEIR POWER AND EMPLOYMENT. 27 

was inquired of, after the encouragement given by Ahab's 
lying flatteries : and the whole device was then laid bare, 
though the wicked king rejected the merciful intimation, 
and committing the faithful messenger to prison, rushed 
open-eyed upon his own destruction. 

One more instance of Satanic interference in matters 
far obove our level, may be adduced. The Apostle 
Jude, when denouncing those who "speak evil of dig- 
nities," adds, "Yet Michael the archangel, when con- 
tending with the devil, he disputed about the body of 
Moses, but durst not bring against him a railing accusa- 
tion, but said, The Lord rebuke thee." Jude 9. Some 
indeed, identify this passage with that already cited from 
Zechariah, explaining it of the Jewish polity, or Mosaic 
law; and would therefore object against our advancing 
it as on additional testimony ; but for such identification 
we can see no warrant. It would rather seem to refer 
to the fact, that the Lord so hid the actual human body 
of Moses, that "No man knoweth of his sepulchre unto 
this day." Deut. xxxiv. 6. 

These occasional glimpses of the invisible world are 
exceedingly awful : instead of regarding the adversary 
as a contemptible being, we can scarcely overrate his 
importance. Possessed of a power that we cannot 
rightly estimate, and rilled with a malignity the most 
direful and implacable, he is not a solitary individual 
waging alone the war of rebellion and ruin : he has 
hosts unnumbered at command, as we have already 
shown ; and doubtless he knows too well the value of 
order and subordination not to avail himself, as a skil- 



28 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



ful general, of his whole disposable force. What, then, 
is his employment, and to what object does he bend 
these superhuman energies and mighty means 1 The 
answer may be found in any part of the Bible 
— we trace him by his operations, where he is not 
actually named ; and we know that so far as it concerns 
us, all may be summed up in three words, Hostility to 
man, He sought to deface the work of creation, 
in its bright morning prime ; and to a sad extent he 
succeeded : the work of redemption was undertaken, 
through the tender mercies of God, to repair that deadly 
breach ; and to resist it is the perpetual aim of Satan 
and his angels. Alike to him is the task to impede a 
great national movement towards Christ, and to lure a 
little child from the way of righteousness. In either 
case he puts forth his subtle power, and never loses sight 
of the object. Foreknowledge he does not possess : 
that is the prerogative of Deity^ alone ; but his calcula- 
tions must be wonderfully accurate, considering that to 
the high angelic faculties of his nature, he adds the ex- 
perience of some six thousand years of intimate concern 
in the affairs of men : and a perfect acquaintance with 
all knowledge and all mysteries, attainable by created 
intelligence. Before him are spread out all the pheno- 
mena of nature : the stars in their courses, the ocean in 
its depths, the earth in all her hidden recesses, and all 
the complicated operations of her vast elemental labora- 
tory, are visible to him. Long ere the shadow of a cloud 
encroaches on the unruffled sky bounded by our hori- 
zon, he perceives the coming storm, and prepares to 



THEIR POWER AND EMPLOYMENT. 29 

seize such victims as he hopes may be delivered to him 
during the terrible convulsion. While all above is peace 
and serenity, he watches the internal combustion, and 
gloats over the slumbering city about to be inundated 
with a flood of burning lava, or swallowed in the yawning 
chasms of this quaking earth. He looks into man's 
wonderful frame, and with a practised skill that no re- 
finement of mortal art can attain to, marks the seeds of 
incipient disease, as they take root, and tend, perhaps 
unsuspected by the heedless individual, to the harvest of 
death — too often, alas! a harvest of wrath and ruin. 
Omnipresence is not his ; but motion quicker than our 
thoughts he can no doubt command ; and with an army 
of zealous followers, so well trained to execute his be- 
hests, he may leave it in their hands to work out some 
deep laid schemes of his devising in one quarter, while 
he speeds to the uttermost parts of the earth to pursue 
the same employment, perhaps in a distinct form ; per- 
haps so as to harmonize with, and to help forward the 
preceding mischief. 

In order rightly to estimate the peril that we are in 
from this tremendous enemy, we must consider first, 
that all are sinners, condemned by the law of God ; 
" that without shedding of blood there is no remission," 
and that, therefore, each individual believer may and 
must say of Christ, He loved ?ne, and gave himself for 
me. Christ will never overlook, or be indifferent to any 
soul for which he shed his precious blood : in their final 
salvation he sees the travail of his own soul, and is satis- 
fied : and we have no lack of evidence that to wrest a 
3* 



30 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



single human being from the hand of the Saviour is an 
enterprise, however hopeless, in which Satan is content 
to embark all his energies ; and to put into motion all 
the vast machinery placed at his disposal. He desires 
to have them that he may sift them as wheat ; yet to 
judge by the language of many excellent people, it would 
seem as though they considered their own corrupt na- 
ture and evil tendencies as the only hinderance in the 
heavenly race. This is a dangerous mistake : the Bi- 
ble shows us in a most impressive manner how our ad- 
versary works upon that nature which he first prevailed 
to currupt. David, full of ease and abundance, medi- 
tates on the extent and stability of his wide kingdom 
and Satan takes advantage of it to suggest an act that 
he knew would be highly displeasing to the Lord, and 
probably bring a judgment on the nation. " Satan stood 
up against Israel, and provoked David to number Is- 
rael." 1 Chron. xxi. 1. Even Joab, the most godless, 
unscrupulous man, and at the same time the most de- 
voted subject and zealous patriot, saw the danger of this 
foolish act, and remonstrated against it. But the Devil 
had possessed the king's mind with a fancy in which he 
would not submit to be crossed, and the consequence 
was a destroying visitation on the land. Job was pious 
and prosperous, the enemy attributed his godliness to 
his gains, and obtained leave to try him by heavy losses, 
calamities, and bodily sufferings; then stirred up his 
wife to counsel blasphemy and suicide, and failing of 
that, instigated his friends to tax him with hypocrisy, 
and to represent these afflictions as an evident judgment 



THEIR. POWER AND EBIPLOYMEN T. 



SI 



from God, sent to brand him in the sight of the world as 
a gross though secret transgressor. Of all his infernal 
devices this is one of the worst, and by no means un- 
frequent. Satan first, by the divine permission, afflicts 
a child of God, and then works on the pride, the rash- 
ness, the folly of some friend to pour corrosive acids 
into the wound where the softest oil of Christian sympa- 
thy and love ought rather to trickle down. The opera- 
tor sees a cause and a need-be, for his friend's grievance 
far removed from those which the Lord saw when he 
smote : and taking this phantom of Satan's conjuring 
up for a reality, proceeds to do the arch-fiend's bidding 
by helping forward the affliction in a clumsy attempt to 
deal wisely with it. Thus he tormented Job, by means 
of his three friends, whom he also exposed to the 
Lord's severe displeasure by provoking them to such 
presumptuous sin ; while Job, whose real fault was un- 
renewed blindness to the corruption of his nature, reap- 
ed a two-fold temporal, and a ten thousand-fold spiritual 
blessing from what the Devil hoped to turn to his de- 
struction. Judas was of a covetous disposition, and 
would have been a thief whenever he had opportunity ; 
but Satan marked him out for the deepest crime that it 
was possible for man to perpetrate once throughout all 
eternity. "Then entered Satan into Judas, surnamed 
Iscariot :" (Luke xxii. 3.) What an awful expression 
is that ! the chief adversary of God and man became 
for a time incarnate to oppose, and by opposing to ac- 
complish, the great object of the Lord Jehovah in 
coming down to earth. He pervaded with his diabolical 



32 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



influence the mind and spirit of his willing victim, and 
led him on from the mere indulgence of avaricious 
thoughts to the terrible transgression for which no name 
can be found ; then left him to despair, to suicide, and 
to hell. Ananias and Sapphira were doubly covetous : 
of lucre and of fame ; they wanted both to keep their 
money, and to obtain applause for sacrificing it to the 
public good. Of this Satan took advantage to fill their 
hearts with a lie, by which they might hope to accom- 
plish the desired end. But it was to the Holy Ghost 
that the lie was told, and instantaneous death was the 
penalty of seeking either to deceive the Lord, or to make 
Him connive at their guilt 

These instances exhibit the manner of Satan's work- 
ing, where, but for what is revealed, we might suppose 
no such agency had existed. It was needful that Eve 
should be tempted from without, since the image of God 
yet remained within, and her heart, still holy and obe- 
dient, would not have suggested a departure from the 
path of His commandments. But the idea of number- 
ing Israel — taking a census — in time of peace, and 
under every favourable circumstance, appears so natural 
that we probably should not search beyond the king's 
desire to know the extent of Israel's population, had not 
the Holy Spirit expressly told us who provoked Lim to 
it. In like manner Job's calamities might be referred 
to the predatory habits of his Arab neighbours, to the 
sudden storms and blasts of the desert, and to the bodi- 
ly effects often produced by excessive mental suffering ; 
while the erroneous view taken by his three friends was 



i 



THEIR POWER AND EMPLOYMENT. 



33 



perfectly consistent with those frequently formed by 
ourselves, concerning others, when we should be loth to 
imagine that the Devil was prompting us. Judas might 
have been supposed to perpetuate his unparalleled 
crime under the impression that his Master would, as he 
had more than once before done, deliver himself by a 
miracle from the hands into which he was about to sell 
him : and Ananias with his wife, might have arranged 
their plan under the impulse of natural vanity combined 
with love of money. Yet in all these cases we are dis- 
tinctly told that Satan himself was present to instigate 
and direct ; and many a recollection of our own past 
lives, now perhaps painful and self-condemnatory, would 
wring our hearts with anguish and horror if we knew 
how far the great adversary was concerned in them, 
and to what extent the will of God was resisted, the 
cause of Christ injured, and the Holy Ghost grieved, 
while evil spirits looked on rejoicing. We " give place 
to the Devil " daily ; and nothing more effectually helps 
him to lead us into this breach of a positive command, 
than our readiness to forget his continual presence, 
either personally or by his active ministers ; and per- 
haps to leave out of sight the fact of his very existence* 



III. 



SATANIC DARING. 



The truth being established that there exists a compa- 
ny of evil spirits, continually employed in resisting the 
power of God, and stirring up his creatures to rebel 
against his authority, it is not to be expected that in 
every instance cited as illustrating this truth, precise 
mention by name should be made of those who are 
clearly exhibited in that work. Very many cases may 
be adduced where such mention is distinctly made ; and 
in tracing others to the same source, we must bear in 
mind the apostolic warning, " Let no man say when he 
is tempted, I am tempted of God : for God cannot be 
tempted of evil, neither tempteth he any man ; but every 
man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own 
lust and enticed." James i. 13, 14. The plan, there- 
fore, of Satan is to watch the indications of our prevail- 
ing corruptions, and to provide us with opportunities of 
gratifying them, that lust when it hath conceived may 
the more readily bring forth the sin which, as the 
enemy well knows, will, when it is finished, bring forth 
death. 



SATANIC DARING. 



35 



Nor is it to the evil passions alone that he appeals: 
his daring knows no bounds. Even in the holy nature 
of the man Christ Jesus, as untainted by original or by 
actual sin, he could seek for somewhat whereon to build 
a powerful temptation. He had been incessantly as- 
sailing the patient Saviour in the wilderness, during forty 
days; at the end of which he saw him tortured by the 
cravings of a hunger, which the termination of his pre- 
scribed season of fasting left him at liberty to satisfy. 
Now it would have been every whit as easy for our 
Lord, by the putting forth of his infinite power, to 
transform a stone into bread, as to multiply five loaves 
to the satisfying of five thousand people ; or out of the 
stones of the temple to raise up children unto Abraham. 
The desire for food was natural, lawful ; yea, it was a 
duty to satisfy it, since prolonged abstinence must end 
in self-murder. We may indulge in guesses and sup- 
positions as to the precise grounds on which the sug- 
gestion stood as a temptation of the Devil, but all that 
we can certainly know is, the fact, that so it was, and 
that as such it was rejected. Coming as it did in the 
shape of a proposal merely to satisfy a human want by 
means of his divine power, we see the deep craftiness of 
this insidious and perfidious tempter, and learn a solemn 
lesson of perpetual watchfulness, and careful sifting of 
whatever is suggested to our minds, whether by outward 
circumstances, the counsel of friends, or the seemingly 
intuitive suggestions of our own minds : for he who 
assailed the Master will not spare the servant. 

Again, the object of our Lord's incarnation was to 



36 



SATANIC DARING. 



wrest from Satan the kingship of the world ; to cast him 
out of his possessions, to take the prey from the mighty, 
and deliver the lawful captive. This was to be accom- 
plished by exceeding bitter sufferings, of which a fore- 
taste was then present, in the pangs of extreme hunger. 
Humanity shrank from what Deity foreknew, and we 
have very touching statements from the evangelists, of 
the anguish that overwhelmed the blessed Jesus on the 
near approach of the climax of his woes. He was even 
brought to pray, " 0 my Father, if it be possible, let this 
cup pass from me !" Matt. xxvi. 39. Yet in all this not 
a taint of evil existed ; it was the innocent shrinking of 
innocent, holy flesh, from intense tortures. Of this Sa- 
tan seems to have taken his next advantage ; for he ex- 
hibited to the divine object of his infernal artifices all the 
kingdoms of the world, with a reference to his own ac- 
knowledged sovereignty over them, and proposed terms 
on which he would consent to abdicate in favour of his 
dreaded opponent, so rendering needless the terriffic 
conflict in which the Lord must engage to effect his ex- 
pulsion by force. This was a most refined temptation: 
it proposed a single momentary act of homage, in ac- 
knowledgment of the existing supremacy of that en- 
throned rebel and traitor, to be followed by the instanta- 
neous resignation of his usurped dominion into the hands 
of the rightful King. He saw the mortal frame droop- 
ing under prolonged inanition ; he knew how closely the 
human mind naturally sympathized with the body's fee- 
bleness : he calculated on the effect of forty days' endu- 
rance of hunger, thirst, weariness, solitude, and unshelt- 



SATANIC DARING. 



37 



ered exposure ; and he, the Devil, the liar and the mur- 
derer, boldly ventured on a proposition, the nature of 
which sends a shudder through the heart of the Chris- 
tian, for whose sake the Lord of glory was exposed to 
such an indignity as this ! But it gives a very terrible 
view of the self-confident greatness of the adversary. 
May it sink deep into our minds, and fill us with that 
salutary fear which shall keep us ever mindful of the 
foe's devices* 

The Lord's reply was strongly indignant ; " Get thee 
hence, Satan !" But now this holy indignation, this 
desire to be freed from the presence of the arch-fiend 
who had been harassing him for forty days and nights, 
this detestation of his odious suggestions, was next laid 
hold of as the ground-work of a third temptation. By 
the exercise of that mysterious power, of the nature of 
which we must remain ignorant, but ought never to be 
forgetful, the devil placed his destined conqueror on a 
pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem, and calling to his 
aid the Scriptures, which had been successfully opposed 
to his preceding attempts, he invited the Saviour to 
cast himself down ; "for it is written, He shall give 
his angels charge over thee, to keep thee, and in their 
hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou 
dash thy foot against a stone." Luke iv. 10, 11. To 
be at once delivered from the immediate presence of 
Satan, and received into the arms of the holy angels ; 
while to decline it was apparently to shrink not only 
from the proof of his divinity, but also from a test of in- 
dividual faith in the promise of God, — this was a snare, 
4 



33 



OP EVIL SPIRITS : 



the craft and subtlety of which are not always suffi- 
ciently considered ; nor the practical use of the lesson 
regarded. For, be it remembered, it was no necessary 
part of our redemption to make us acquainted with 
such a passage in our Lord's experience : the Holy 
Ghost has very sparingly revealed to us the particulars 
of what was by far the most grievous portion of his 
sufferings : we are not told what took place during the 
forty days, throughout the whole period of which St. 
Luke tells us, he was tempted of the devil. The thorny 
crown, the scourge, the nails, the spear, were the lot 
of many others, whose physical frames suffered, per- 
haps, no less exquisitely the pangs of a torturing death : 
but here we have a glimpse of mental and spiritual en- 
durances, such as would crush the whole mass of guilty 
men — " the travail of his soul" — the " sorrows" and 
the "grief;" the heavy pressure wherewith "it pleased 
the Lord to bruise him." Isaiah liii. 10. We know not 
what ensued, when, just previous to this fearful agony 
in the garden, the Lord said, " The Prince of this world 
cometh." John xiv. 30. Neither can we penetrate what 
was implied in the expression used to the wretched men 
who seized on him, — " This is your hour, and the 'power 
of darkness." Luke xxii. 53. Hereafter we shall doubt- 
less know what in their present burdened state our 
spirits could not support : we shall better comprehend 
the nature and intensity of sufferings undergone by Him 
who poured out his soul unto death for us : but since 
what is given by inspiration is written for our learning, 
we may be assured that the scene so distinctly sketched 



SATANIC DARING. 



89 



of the mysterious encounter between the Son of right- 
eousness and the prince of darkness, is intended to fill 
us with godly fear ; to keep us watchful against the tre- 
mendous foe, and to endear to us the written word of 
the Old Testament, which some Christians are apt to 
slight ; but which furnished the Captain of our salvation 
with weapons wherewith to repel the bold assailant. The 
deity of Jesus is the sword, from which Satan shrinks ; 
and even in the brief, but inexpressibly momentous nar- 
rative referred to, there is observable a constant refer* 
ence, on our Lord's part, to the eternal God, which 
appears calculated to remind the rebel that He, with 
whom he was presumptuously dealing, was yet the 
Lord his God. Some have represented this assault as 
planned by the evil one, to satisfy himself as to the fact 
of Jesus being the Christ : we cannot subscribe to this 
view: surely the prince of the devils was not worse in- 
formed than his subordinates, who, on the approach of 
our Lord, evermore yelled forth their confessions of his 
deity, and deprecated the visitation of his wrath. Satan 
knew full well, that the elect angels were no liars, like 
himself; and when in songs of joy and praise they an- 
nounced to the shepherds the birth of " a Saviour, 
which is Christ the Lord," he could not disbelieve their 
testimony. The particulars of that miraculous birth 
were not concealed from him ; neither was the promise 
which God gave to Eve, or the prediction declared to 
Ahaz, unknown. Still less can we for a moment sup- 
pose that the testimony given just before, at the Lord's 
baptism, had escaped him. No ; Satan knew with 



40 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



whom he had to do ; and well may ive tremble, when 
we find him taking advantage of the purest concomitants 
of undefiled humanity, and with them tempting the Lord 
his God! 

Scripture likewise unfolds to us many instances in 
which God's servants have been assailed by the enemy, 
under the feigned character of a divine influence, to con- 
firm which he has put forth all his powers, and wrought 
wonders. A very remarkable instance of this is found 
in the story of Israel's deliverance : and though it is a 
part of his craft to lead men so to explain away the pas- 
sages touching himself, as to neutralize in a great degree 
God's gracious purpose in dictating them, we are not 
bound to follow their glosses, — we may venture to take 
Scripture as we find it, and to believe that when the Holy 
Ghost says a thing, he means what he says, and not 
something else. The marvels that Satan wrought by 
means of Pharaoh's magicians were calculated not only 
to harden the heart of the tyrant against the truly miracu- 
lous manifestations of God's power, but also to stagger 
the faith of Moses and Aaron in the divine origin of their 
mission. We are not at liberty to call them juggling 
deceptions, as some do ; mere sleight of hand tricks, 
performed by Court conjurors : the word of God declares 
them to have been realities : and most instructive they 
are to us, who, looking for the national redemption and 
final restoration of Israel, according to the Lord's pro- 
mise, now very near at hand, may expect to witness 
fearful things done in opposition to it by the power of 
Satan, who hates the Jew with an implacable hatred. 



SATANIC DARING. 



41 



We find the magicians of Egypt doing what man, with- 
out supernatural aid could never have accomplished. 
" Now the magicians of Egypt, they also did in like 
manner with their enchantments ; for they cast down 
every man his rod, and they became (not they seemed 
to become) serpents : but Aaron's rod swallowed up their 
rods." Exod. vii. 11, 12. Here was a great wonder 
wrought by the power of Satan, but overruled to the 
fuller proof of the mighty work of God. When Moses 
turned the water into blood, the magicians did the same, 
but of course on a very small scale, since there could be 
but little left for them to practise upon. Again, they 
were able to imitate a miracle, by bringing up frogs upon 
the land ; but now the power of Satan ended ; the next 
wonder was one of creation, and life, even the lowest 
order of animal life is not his to bestow. He can kill, 
when permitted ; but to make alive was never given to 
him. His agents essayed to bring up frogs, from the 
recesses where they were hidden, and succeeded : but 
when they attempted to bring forth lice from the dust of 
the earth, they utterly failed. It does not appear that 
after this they ventured on increasing the swarms of flies, 
as they had done that of frogs ; or to smite the cattle of 
the children of Israel, when the Lord had destroyed those 
of the Egyptians : and the next visitation drove them 
out of the royal presence, covered with loathsome sores 
which their infernal master had no power to heal. 

How encouraging is this to us ! Satan may do much 
to terrify, to perplex, and to afflict us ; but as soon as he 
touches on a single attribute of the Most High, he fails, 
4* 



42 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



and is put to flight. Yet to make it appear that what 4 he 
does is done immediately by the Lord, is almost always 
his plan. Thus we find, when destroying the flocks of 
Job and their attendants, he so managed his elements of 
destruction, that the terrified messenger of evil tidings 
described it as a divine visitation : " The fire of God is 
fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep and 
the servants, and consumed them." Job i. 16. It could 
not but dreadfully aggravate the affliction of the righteous 
man, to regard these sore trials as marks of the Lord's 
indignation, proceeding directly from Him : and no doubt 
it was so arranged to add power to the detestable sug- 
gestion conveyed through his wife. But though Job be* 
lieved the lie* his faith in God's love failed not : by faith 
he endured, and through faith he triumphed. If we do 
not distinctly see in what manner faith acts as a shield, 
or how effectually it quenches all the fiery darts of the 
wicked, it is because we do not sufficiently search the 
Scriptures. They abound with glorious illustrations ; 
and the path of safety is so clearly laid down, that the 
wayfaring men though fools, shall not err therein, if they 
simply attend to the indications given. To those who 
study it with prayer, as a book written not for the learned 
but for "the poor of this world," the "fools," the "babes," 
to whom the Lord has declared that he will make his 
wonders of salvation known, the Bible is of all works the 
most intelligible ; only rendered otherwise by the foolish 
" wisdom of this world," holding up its moonlight to 
make the sun visible. Satan owes much even to the 
best of commentators ; for they have frequently assisted 



SATANIC DARING. 



43 



to veil both his person and his devices, by their ill-judged 
attempts at elucidation, which, taken in their literal sense, 
God's words would have revealed important practical 
truths respecting him. 

We are dwelling principally on the display of satanic 
presumption as the usurping god of this world : the 
means by which that usurpation was effected, present a 
fearful view of his daring self-reliance. In his very 
first approach to our unhappy race, then rejoicing in 
sinless felicity, he deliberately contradicted the express 
declaration of the Most High God ; and appealing, as 
afterwards in the case of the second Adam, to a perfectly 
innocent, laudable desire, he stirred up Eve to seek 
higher attainments in knowledge, a clearer perception 
of good, as opposed to evil ; then stimulating this thirst 
for information beyond due bounds — leading it to over- 
pass the landmark of submission to the Divine will, he 
accomplished at once what must have appeared to him- 
self a most hazardous undertaking. To represent God 
a3 a liar could not but be congenial to the diabolical 
nature of the accursed spirit of evil ; but that a creature 
so formed to know, to love, and to serve the Lord, sur- 
rounded on all sides with the profusion of his bounty, 
and continually drinking from the fountain of all spirit- 
ual, all intellectual, all physical enjoyment, under His 
paternal hand, — that such a creature should at the first 
word be persuaded to credit the lie, and to rush into 
open transgression, must have been marvellous in the 
eyes of the tempter. How marvellous in our's must 
be the extreme daring that prompted him to the enter- 
prise. 



44 



OP EVIL SPIRITS : 



After such a proof of the weakness of human nature, 
while yet wholly untainted with sin, and the observation 
during many ages of the frightful depravity into which 
a being, originally created after the image of God, might 
easily be led, it becomes less inconceivable that Satan 
should have availed himself of the permission given to 
assault the man, Christ Jesus ; for be it always remem- 
bered, that only by permission could he approach the 
Saviour. We are distinctly told, that after the baptism 
and public recognition from heaven of our blessed Lord, 
preparatory to his ministerial, or prophetical, work upon 
earth, " Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the 
wilderness, to be tempted of the devil." Matt. iv. 1. — 
However high, however powerful, however privileged 
the great adversary may be, during the time of his yet 
remaining unbound, still, in the sight of God, he is 
equally helpless and. contemptible, as he is hateful. He 
durst not even utter an extenuating word when his doom 
was pronounced, together with that of his wretched vic- 
tims : he cannot hurt a hair on the head of one of Christ's 
meanest followers, without a special leave so to do ; and 
then he cannot overpass the precise boundary of his 
permitted machinations. " Behold, the devil shall cast 
some of you into prison, that ye may be tried ; and ye 
shall have tribulation ten days." Rev. ii. 10. Some, 
not all, he should have leave to cast into prison, and 
they only that they might be tried, not destroyed ; and 
their trial should continue ten days, not a minute longer. 
His commission, no doubt, is much larger with respect 
to those who are still in " the snare of the devil ; who 



SATANIC DARING. 



45 



are taken captive by him at his will," (2 Tim. ii. 26,) 
and who will ultimately share his burning abode for ever, 
if they turn not to Christ for deliverance ; but the blessed 
work of the Gospel preached unto man is " to turn them 
from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan 
unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, 
and inheritance among them which are sanctified by 
faith which is in Christ ;" Acts xxvi. 18 : and when this 
is once accomplished, the devil is compelled to recognise 
the indwelling power and presence of his conqueror in 
them ; and without a special leave, granted for some 
wise purpose. " That wicked one toucheth them not." 



IV. 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



Bold as he is, and potent as he is, Satan rarely goes to 
work in a straightforward manner. He is still the old 
serpent, accomplishing by craft his insidious purposes, 
gliding stealthily on the path of his intended victim, and 
concealing himself beneath the innocent flowers with 
which the Creator has bountifully clad that path. In 
some parts of the world he does indeed enforce upon his 
bond-slaves the horrible service of worshipping him 
openly and by name, in order to deprecate the temporal 
mischief that they know he is able and willing to do 
them ; but, generally, he veils himself under fictitious 
names and forms, so obtaining to himself and his angels 
the honour and service that are due to God alone. St. 
Paul tells us this : " What say I then 1 that the idol is 
anything, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is 
anything? But I say, that the things which the Gentiles 
sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God; and 
I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. 
Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



47 



devils : ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and 
of the table of devils." 1 Cor. x. 19, 20,21. Satan 
persuades the poor heathen that some divine power re- 
sides in a beast, a reptile, a stone, or the stock of a tree ; 
and having induced him to worship it, takes to himself 
and to his gang of devils the honours paid to the sense- 
less idol. Well may he be termed the god of this world ! 
To all its successive empires, crumbling into dust as 
they have done, he has been the object of supreme 
homage. The Babylonian might fall prostrate before 
his gigantic idol of gold ; the Persian breathe his devout 
aspirations to the fiery orb of day ; the Greek rejoice 
in his sculptured forms of exquisite beauty, and in the 
endless mysteries of an impure worship ; the stern Ro- 
man might crowd his pantheon with the captured idols 
of every nation, and enlarge his unholy creed for the re- 
ception of each foreign fable ; but in all, and over all, 
Satan ruled. Wherever idolatry is found, there is Satan 
the god of the worshippers. His voice was heard in 
the lowing of the Egyptian abomination, in the decree 
that prostrated the glory of the Chaldeans on the plain 
of Dura, and in every incentive to creature-worship 
under whatsoever form observed, and by whatsoever 
sanctions confirmed. The voice that from the Minaret 
proclaims the true prophetic character of Mahomet, is 
his ; the bell that tinkles forth a signal for the adoration 
of a wafer»>god, is sounded by him : yea, the secret 
whisper from within that withholds the hand about to 
extend the gift of charity, is the voice of his power too, 
for " covetousness is idolatry." Col. iii. 5. By fraudful 



4S 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



cunning, under a thousand manifestations, he upholds 
his unseen acknowledged dominion ; never to be over- 
thrown till the Stone, cut out without hands, shall smite 
the huge image of universal idolatry, and gathering to 
itself the little faithful band of protesters against this 
multifarious devil worship, so fill the earth as to thrust 
out of it whatsoever resist the extension of that Stone's 
triumphant kingdom. 

To adduce instances of all the devices of Satan's cun- 
ning recorded by, or to be clearly inferred from the holy 
Scriptures, would be little less than to transcribe the 
Bible itself: we may however mention some few, where 
diabolical interference is expressly spoken of. The 
Sciptures do not often explain the part that the tempter 
and his hosts took in the toils, the struggles, the sins of 
the Old Testament church : but under the gospel dispen- 
sation, enough is revealed to enable us to trace his work- 
ings in former times, even where he was not specified by 
name. Who can fail to see this in the touching history 
of Joseph? When the youth declared his dream, the 
meaning was evident to his father, and his brothers were 
compelled to see it in the same light, galling as it was to 
their pride. Their envious, angry dispositions gave oc- 
casion for the tempter to assail them, and to suggest the 
cruel expedient by which, as they hoped, the "dreamer" 
was finally put out of their way ; and in the varied per- 
secutions that followed the blameless young believer, 
the malice of an adversary, potent and crafty, like Satan, 
may be plainly discerned. When the children of Israel 
corrupted themselves and made a golden calf, and wor- 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



49 



shipped it in the name of the Lord, the artful adaptation 
to their circumstances of the idolatrous abominations 
that they had seen in Egypt no doubt originated in the 
same quarter : while the continual outbursts of discon- 
tent, disobedience, strife, and open rebellion against their 
leader, that marked the progress of the rescued tribes 
through the wilderness, all bear witness to his influence 
among them. Recollecting, as it has already been ob- 
served, that the Holy Ghost declares idol-worship to be 
devil-worship, we have positive proof that Satan and his 
legions presided over the heathen nations who sur- 
rounded the camp of Israel ; and all the seductive arts 
practised by Balaam and others, to ensnare the Lord's 
people into forbidden paths, were certainly of his devis- 
ing. Moses, when writing, as he is supposed to have 
done, the book of Job, must have received a very clear 
revelation concerning the power and activity of this fear- 
ful foe, although the record that he was commissioned 
to leave of his own people's history, makes precise men- 
tion of the evil one, as personally interfering with them: 
but he says, in the Lord's name, of the Israelites, " They 
shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after 
whom they have gone "a whoring Lev. xvii. 7 ; and 
again, "They sacrificed unto devils, not to God ; to gods 
whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, 
whom your fathers feared not." Deut. xxxii. 17. While 
against the sin of witchcraft, the acquirement of power 
or knowledge by means of Satanic communications, the 
law was very strict. "A man, also, or woman, that hath 
a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put 

5 



50 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



to death : they shall stone them with stones : their blood 
shall be upon them." Lev. xx. 27. By this we see, 
that Satan had contrived to obtain a footing among God's 
peculiar people ; that he had seduced them into holding 
intercourse with his subordinates for the purpose of shar- 
ing such supernatural gifts as he could impart ; and se- 
cretly, by fraud and cunning, maintained this ground in 
the bosom of the visible Church. Most earnestly were 
they warned against this, the great condemning sin of 
the nations of Canaan : " There shall not be found among 
you any one... that useth divination, or an observer of 
times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a 
consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necro- 
mancer. For all that do these things are an abomina- 
tion unto the Lord ; and because of these abominations, 
the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee." 
Deut. xviii. 10 — 12. That this peculiar mode of de- 
stroying God's people was persisted in by the crafty ene- 
my to the very time of our Lord's appearance in the flesh, 
we have constant proof. When Abimelech, the son of 
Gideon, by a cruel conspiracy with the men of She- 
chem, slew his brethren, and obtained the chief power, 
the Lord defeated and punished both the guilty parties 
by sending an evil spirit to embroil them to their mutual 
destruction — a business well suited to the malignant 
subtlety of a devil ; to whose suggestions, no doubt, or 
to those of one like him, the young man owed -his suc- 
cessful progress in treachery so far. When Saul great- 
ly offended the Lord, his chastisement was heavy : " The 
Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



£1 



from the Lord troubled him." 1 Sam. xvi. 14. Thus 
commissioned, the evil spirit gave that unhappy king no 
rest, during the period of his visitations ; but alternately 
depressed with melancholy, cankered with envy, and in- 
flamed with murderous rage the mind of his victim ; im- 
pelling him even to hurl a javelin at the loving, dutiful 
son, whose generosity interposed between him and the 
ill-requited minstrel, from whose holy strains of music 
the tormenting devil had so often fle'd. When the same 
monarch, in the near prospect of his last fatal battle, 
consummated his offences by seeking to one who had a 
familiar spirit, and requiring cf her the exercise of what 
he, as the Lord's vicegerent, was solemnly bound to 
suppress, and if detected, to punish with death, we find 
him answered according to his folly, and driven to utter 
despair by the seeming success of an accursed spell. 
1 Sam. xxviii. 

Much has been written to elucidate, and not a little 
to explain away that extraordinary scene at En-dor; but 
when all has been said that man can say, there the brief, 
plain record stands, exactly as they found it, and all the 
wisdom of the wise fails to throw light on what God has 
left obscure. The word of God expressly declares, that 
it was Samuel. "And Samuel said to Saul " — verse 15. 
" Then said Samuel "— 16. # Saul "was sore afraid, be- 
cause of the words of Samuel" — 20. The terror, too, 
of the woman, and her remarkable expression, "I saw 
gods ascending out of the earth," v. 13, would plainly 
imply, that her incantations had been followed by some- 
thing wholly different from what she anticipated; she 



52 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



had invoked devils, but "gods," probably bright angelic 
beings, made visible to her for some wise purpose, ap- 
peared, bearing with them the resuscitated body of the 
buried seer, commissioned to assure the king that he 
and his sons should, on the morrow, be numbered with 
Samuel and the rest of the dead. We have no reason 
to suppose that the inspired narrative is otherwise than 
simply true : indeed, there is a daring presumption in 
questioning it : "Let God be true, and every man a liar." 
Rom. iii. 4. Least of all may we listen to those who 
would, in this case, as in that of Pharaoh's enchanters, 
represent witchcraft as a mere juggling imposition on 
the senses of the credulous ; and ascribe the woman's 
astonishment, not to the angelic character of those who 
came at the call, but to the appearance of any spiritual 
being whatever when she had only meant to play off a 
deception on the king. We ought rather to hail it as a 
glorious proof of the Lord's watchful care over the dust, 
yea, over the names of his own people, which he will 
not suffer devils to tamper with ; and whatever difficul- 
ties remain to baffle our inquisitiveness, let them teach 
us humility, and remind us that secret things belong unto 
ihe Lord our God ;" Deut. xxix. 29 ; and that it is not 
to believers the description ought to apply, "intruding 
into those things which he^hath not seen, vainly puffed 
up by his fleshly mind." CoL ii. 18. 

That devils continued to pollute the land of Canaan, 
and to exercise their wicked ingenuity in leading the 
Lord's people to transgress, we have sufficient testimony. 
Ezekiel sets before us an awful picture of the aborning 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



53 



tions committed in Jerusalem by those practices which 
the Lord had denounced as sacrificing unto devils. In 
the eighth chapter of his prophecy, he relates what he saw 
in the "chambers of imagery:" followed by a descrip- 
tion of the vengeance to be taken : and Zechariah, proph- 
esying of mercy to be shown when the Lord should heal 
the breach of his people, has this promise, "And it shalj 
come to pass in that day, saith the Lord of Hosts, that 
I will cut off the names of idols out of the land, and they 
shall be no more remembered ; and also, I will cause 
the prophets and the unclean spirits to pass out of the 
land." Zech. xiii. 2. By what artifices these evil crea- 
tures opposed the work of God, we are, however, far 
more distinctly shown in the New Testament, where we 
find their nature, operations, and objects laid open in a 
wonderful manner by Him who came upon the strong 
man, took away his armour wherein he trusted, and di- 
vided his spoils. 

One specimen of deep cunning is given in the very 
first instance, particularly related of a case of posses- 
sion : it occurs in the eighth chapter of St. Matthew's 
gospel. " And when he was come to the other side of the 
country of the Gergesenes, there met him two possessed 
with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, 
so that no man might pass that way. And behold, they 
cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, 
thou Son of God? Art thou come hither to torment us 
before the time 1 And there was a good way off from 
them an herd of many swine feeding ; so the devils be- 
sought him, saying, If thou cast us out, suffer us to go 
5* 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



away into the herd of swine. And he said unto them, 
Go. And when they were come out they went into the 
herd of swine : and behold the whole herd of swine ran 
violently down a steep place into the sea, and perished 
in the waters." Here we see, first the deprecatory cry 
of the fiends ; acknowledging the omnipotence of the 
Lord, but pleading that the set time for tormenting them 
in the fiery pit was not yet come. They are good cal- 
culators of prophetic periods, and perfectly knew that 
their time on earth had not expired. Next, they made 
a request, the drift of which we could not have seen but 
for the effects that followed its success. They asked 
ieave to enter the swine ; blessed be God ! Satan has no 
power even over unclean beasts, unless it be specially 
given of the Lord. Having permission, they instantly 
availed themselves of it by drowning every one of the 
herd in the sea ; and by this manoeuvre they so alarmed 
the neighbouring inhabitants, who could expect no less 
from such a beginning than that the unknown visiter 
would destroy all their property, as to prompt a general 
request that he would depart out of their coasts. Thus 
for the time, was the dreaded gospel averted from a whole 
city, by the exceeding craft of these devils ; and in per- 
mitting their vile contrivance to succeed, the Lord mer- 
cifully provided a rich warning lesson for his church, to 
the end of time. May we all have grace to use it effec- 
tually in our wrestling contest with the principalities and 
powers of darkness ! 

Another mode of undermining where they durst not 
openly attack, was practised against the teaching of the 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



55 



Apostles. In Acts xvi. 16, we have the account. "And 
it came to pass, as we went to prayer, a certain damsel 
possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which 
brought her masters much gain by soothsaying ; the 
same followed Paul and us, saying, These men are the 
* servants of the Most High God, which shew unto us the 
way of salvation. And this she did many days. But 
Paul, being grieved, turned and said to the spirit, I com- 
mand thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of 
her. And he came out the same hour." In this, as in 
the preceding case, the devil's device is shown by its 
fruits. His object in thus following and publicly testi- 
fying to the divine origin of the Apostle's teaching was 
probably two-fold. While allowed to continue it, he 
might expect to cast a slur on the doctrine in which a 
devil could thus approvingly seem to acquiesce, while a 
professed witch appeared as a daily follower of those 
who taught it ; and if he provoked them to expel him, he 
might justly calculate on the vengeance of her masters, 
which overtook them immediately, and before night they 
were scourged, imprisoned, and made fast in the stocks. 
Seeing that all this was through the cunning of a devil, 
it is peculiarly delightful to proceed in the story, and 
find the whole overruled of God to the conversion of the 
keeper of the prison, and all his household, the shame 
of the unjust magistrates who had beaten them, and the 
honourable acquittal and dismission of the Apostles from 
the place ; where, no doubt, events so extraordinary 
were blessed to the conviction of many ; the church at 
Philippi being, as we find by his epistle to it, an especial 
cause of thankfulness and joy to Paul. 



56 



OF EVIL SPIRITS I 



Another instance had previously occurred, where a 
sorcerer, one who avowedly held communion with evil 
spirits, and through their workings in him merited the se- 
vere rebuke, " O full of all subtlety and all mischief, thou 
child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness," had 
endeavoured to turn away a Roman deputy from the faith, 
and here the Lord manifested himself by showing that 
all the sorceries of Elymas, and his pretended sanctity, 
could not avert from him the stroke of instant blindness, 
which, to mark it. as a direct visitation from on high, was 
announced by Paul the moment before he overtook him ; 
and this wonder confirmed the Deputy in the faith. Acts 
xiii. 6 — 12. One more instance we have in Simon Ma- 
gus, who was also a sorcerer, and who seemed to have 
been delivered from the dominion of evil spirits, by the 
preaching of the gospel, being able to make such a con- 
fession of faith as entitled him to baptism. In him the 
devil sought to bring a deadly disgrace on the Church 
of Christ, by obtaining the power of conferring the mi- 
raculous gifts of the Holy Ghost on whomsoever he 
would ; or if the idea of being able to buy the gift of 
God with money appear too foolish to have been really 
entertained by a spiritual being, we may suppose that he 
calculated on making the very proposal, from a pro- 
fessed worshipper, redound to the disadvantage of that 
church. In either case he was baffled. Peter was ena- 
bled to "perceive" that this seeming convert was still in 
the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity, and re- 
buked him openly; while the record of the attempt 
serves to this day as an invaluable preservative against 



SATANIC CUNNING. 



57 



certain unscriptural views of baptism that have crept 
into the church. 

By considering in how many instances under the Old 
Testament dispensation, characters appeared, and events 
occurred parallel to these which meet us under the 
clearer light of the New, we may trace such hinderances 
and stumblings among the saints of old to the deep-laid 
plots of the rulers of the darkness of this world ; and by 
such an enlarged view of the enemy's sphere of action 
we may learn to be more earnest in praying that ' all 
those evils which the craft and subtlety of the devil or 
man worketh against us may be brought to nought ; 5 
and may also become more watchfully alert in seeking 
to baffle his devices. 



V, 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 

It seems almost superfluous to devote a section to this 
subject, seeing that every thing we can name, respecting 
Satan and his angels comes under the head of cruelty. 
From the first attempt of the Devil to seduce Eve from 
her allegiance, his object has always been to plunge the 
whole human race into the bottomless pit which he 
knows to be his own portion, 44 the lake which burnetii 
with fire and brimstone." Rev. xxi. 8. But though he 
generally tempts men with the promise, or the posses- 
sion of present enjoyment, alluring them to sell their 
souls for worldly profit, still, whenever he can have his 
own way, he produces present calamities, and heaps 
upon his wretched victims tribulation and anguish as 
well in possession as in prospect. 

On many occasions noted in the scripture, God, by 
his own arm, or by his holy angels, has punished the 
transgressor, but we find him in the majority of instances, 
giving offenders into the hand of Satan, or of wicked 
men who act under his influence for punishment. It is 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



59 



mentioned by the Psalmist, though not by Moses, that 
among the inflictions dealt forth to the tyrannic Egyp- 
tians, this was the greatest ; and the force of the expres- 
sions is very remarkable : after detailing the plagues of 
blood, of flies, of frogs, of caterpillars, of locusts, of 
hail, frost, and thunderbolts, the inspired writer goes 
on : — " He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, 
wrath, and indignation, and trouble^ by sending evil 
angels among them." Psalm Ixxviii. 49. When Satan 
sends an evil angel, he will sorely afflict the object of 
his mission ; but when God looses the restraints of these 
malignant creatures, and bids them smite, it is terrible 
indeed ! 

We must again recall that most important truth, that 
whatsoever worship is rendered to any but God, is ren- 
dered to devils ; and we shall be appalled at the scene 
of present, temporal cruelty and suffering laid open as 
the direct work of evil spirits. Moloch, the great idol 
of the heathen among whom Israel sojourned, was 
worshipped by the immolation of children, butchered 
by the knife and by fire ; and it is awful to think that 
the Lord's own people were ensnared to join in this 
frightful abomination. " They sacrificed their sons and 
their daughters unto devils, and shed innocent blood, 
even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, 
whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan ; and the 
land was polluted with blood." Psalm cvi. 37, 38. If 
the Holy Ghost had not caused this to be written by 
inspiration for our warning, we could not imagine the 
possibility of satanic power, cunning, and cruelty, reach- 



60 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



ing to this point : that parents should' be willing to take 
their tender, helpless babes, and deliver them over to a 
most agonizing form of assassination, as an act of 
homage to the powers of hell, while they themselves 
were actually fed, day by day, with manna from heaven 
sent down by the merciful God, who quenched their 
hourly thirst with water flowing from a stony rock, and 
miraculously following them through the wilderness ; 
where every step of their way was marked by some 
wonder of supernatural care, and all endearing love. 
Here, indeed, must vile human nature lay its unclean 
lips in the dust : and here may proud man learn to 
tremble at the dreadful sovereignty exercised by Satan 
over all who are not translated from the power of dark- 
ness into the kingdom of God, by living faith in the 
Lord Jesus Christ. 

Although every form of idolatry, or devil-worship, 
was not so murderous as that of Moloch, cruelty was, 
and is, the distinguishing feature of all. In a passage 
already quoted, when the Lord tells his faithful Church 
of Smyrna, that he will, for the trial of their faith, give 
Satan power over sonoe of them, the consequences are, 
of course, to be imprisonment and tribulation. We may 
judge from the manner of his dealing with Job, what 
use Satan naturally makes of any such indulgence. 
Calamities were heaped on the patient man faster than 
the tongues of his messengers could utter them. Blood 
and slaughter, burning and crushing, were the imme- 
diate indications of the devil's temporary authority over 
his possessions and his family ; and when he was per- 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



61 



mitted to touch the body of his victim, he left him no 
sound part, from the crown of his head to the sole of 
his foot, but transformed every particle of healthful 
flesh into a loathsome and agonized sore. Not satis- 
fied with this, he stirred up the very person who should 
have been the soother of his sorrows and the stregth- 
ener of his faith, to prompt the self commission of what 
Satan himself was withheld from doing : for there can 
be little doubt that her wicked suggestion to " curse 
God, and die," implied the act of self-murder, to be 
committed in blasphemous defiance of the Lord. But 
here the adversary prevailed not; God had permitted 
him to break the hedge set about Job's temporal pos- 
sessions and comforts, but his life and his soul 
we*e still secured. Failing in this, with what refine- 
ment of prolonged cruelty did the arch fiend insti- 
gate his professed comforters to help forward Job's 
affliction. 

Man's destruction is indeed the regular employment 
of Satan. The Apostle Peter tells us, "Your adver- 
sary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking 
whom he may devour." 1 Pet. v. 8. Like " the young 
lions roaring after their food," he prowls about, hoping 
to find some one forsaken of God, and left as a prey to 
his teeth. That this does sometimes happen, even with 
reference to the Lord' speople, we are clearly told. Paul 
expresses it, when directing the Corinthian Church how 
to act towards a heinous offender, who having given 
place to the devil, was now doomed to experience the 
nature of that service for which he had cast away the 
6 



6.2 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



the easy yoke of Christ. " I, verily, as absent in body, 
but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I 
were present, concerning him that hath done this deed. 
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are 
gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such an one unto Satan 
for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be 
saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." 1 Cor. v. 3 — 5. 
It appears, however, that on giving proof of very deep 
sorrow, and unfeigned repentance, the transgressor was 
received again, after experiencing, no doubt, for a time, 
what it was to be under the temporal power of the evil 
one. Another case of this sort is also mentioned by the 
same Apostle. " Holding faith, and a good conscience ; 
which some having put away, concerning faith have 
made shipwreck ; of whom is HymenaBusand Alexander ; 
whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn 
not to blaspheme." 1 Tim. i. 19, 20. It Would appear 
from this, that a temporary endurance of the devil's 
power is sometimes seen needful for the perverse chil- 
dren of God, in order to terrify them by the fortaste of 
what an eternal subjection to so cruel a master must be ; 
and as Satan knows the length of his chain, he is proba- 
bly quite aware when correction, not destruction, is all 
that he is licensed to inflict. Accordingly he makes the 
most of his time, not lulling and soothing them in their 
guilt, as with those who are wholly his own, but striving, 
as he did with Job, to render them desperate under the 
od that they may either run into despairing sin, " curse 
God, and die," or else, as was near being the case with 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



63 



the Corinthian offender, may utterly faint and perish, 
being " swallowed up of overmuch sorrow." 

The Bible does not specify the particular cruelties 
practised under various forms of idolatry ; but from 
what is perpetrated in the dark places of the earth at 
this day, we may judge of Satan's habitual proceedings 
among his worshippers. Human sacrifices, accompa- 
nied with circumstances of most horrible barbarity, are 
common in many parts of the world : mothers are re- 
quired to butcher their tender infants, children their aged 
parents, and vast numbers of all ages are frequently 
put to death, as an offering to the spirit of a deceased 
ruler, or to be attendants on his soul in another world. 
Self-immolation is enforced as a sacred duty; and if not 
willingly performed, the reluctant victim is murdered. 
On harmless animals most cruel tortures are inflicted, as 
an acceptable service to the devils whom the heathen 
seek to propitiate ; and in that nominally Chrystian sys- 
tem, of which the " coming is after the working of Sa- 
tan," (2 Thess. ii. 9,) whose teachers are " seducing 
spirits," and its distinguishing requirements " doctrines 
of devils," (X Tim. iv. 1,) we find the satanic feature Of 
wanton cruelty developed in full deformity. The rack 
is its main instrument of conversion to an idolatrous 
faith ; and the flames its award to such as will not ven- 
ture to encounter everlasting burnings. Massacre on a 
scale only bounded by the number of its defenceless 
victims, and the limits of its physical power, persecu- 
tion, to the utmost stretch of human endurance, these 
are the lot of its opponents ; while for the members of 



64 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



its own system it has the discipline of the scourge, of 
famishing hunger, of bodily austerity in every imagina- 
ble shape ; and a merciless rending apart of every tie 
that God has formed to sweeten the cup of human life. 
In all this we should recognise the cruel hand of him 
who was a murderer from the beginning, even had not 
the word of God so distinctly set him forth as the frarner 
and upholder of Popery, as to warrant our numbering 
among Scripture evidences, what the prophetic page 
describes in the passages already quoted from St. Paul ; 
and in those of John, when describing the Beast which 
he saw rising out of the sea. He says, " The dragon 
gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority." 
(Rev. xiii. 2.) In the preceding chapter we are told, 
(ver. 9,) that the dragon is, " that old serpent, called 
the devil, and Satan, which deeeiveth the whole world 2" 
and again, of the Beast to whom he gave his power, it is 
written, " It was given unto him to make war with the 
saints and to overcome them xiii. 7. The predictions 
of the Bible are no less certain than its historical rela- 
tions ; and if we desire an instance of the sustained cm-* 
elty of Satan, manifested through a space of twelve hun* 
dred years and upwards, not among barbarous people 
who never heard of the true God, but in the heart, and 
throughout the extent of Christendom, we must look at 
Popery — - the Babylon of prophecy, concerning whom 
it is said, " Babylon the great ... is become the habi- 
tation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a 
cage of every unclean and hateful bird." Rev. xviii. 2, 
The cases of those possessed witli devils is represent- 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



65 



ed as being nearly always one of great suffering. The 
exceptions seem to be those instances where the infer- # 
nal inmate was a welcome confederate, for the sake of 
such supernatural powers as he could confer. Such 
was the " spirit of divination" possessed by the damsel 
who followed Paul and Silas ; the " familiar spirits " that 
enabled Simon Magus, Elymas, and others, to practise 
sorcery ; and the awful entering in of Satan himself into 
Judas Iscariot, who went and completed his tremendous 
bargain under that devilish influence. Among the many 
descriptions of demoniacal cruelty inflicted on the poor 
creatures who were brought to our Lord or to his apos- 
tles, we may notice the daughter of the Syro-Phenician 
woman, who was " grievously vexed with a devil." Matt, 
xv. 22. The poor boy whose father gave so piteous a 
description of his sufferings, afterwards confirmed in the 
presence of our Lord. " Master, I have brought unto 
thee my son which hath a dumb spirit ; and whensoever 
he taketh him, he teareth him: and he foameth and 
gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away." Mark xix. 
17, 18. " And oftentimes it hath cast him into the fire, 
and into the waters, to destroy him," v. 22. " And the 
spirit cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him : 
and he was as one dead ; insomuch that many said, he 
is dead ;" v. 26. The description also, as given by the 
same evangelist, of the demoniac from whom the devils 
passed into the swine, is very awful. " A man with an 
unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the tombs ; 
and no man could bind him, no not with chains : be- 
cause he had been often bound with fetters and chains, 
6* 



65 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



and the chains had been plucked assunder by him, and 
the fetters broken in pieces : neither could any man tame 
him. And always, night and day, he was in the moun- 
tains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with 
stones." Mark v. 2 — 5. Again, we read, " There 
was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen 
years, and was bowed together* and could in no wise 
lift up herself." Luke xiii. 11 : aud that this was a vis- 
itation of Satanic cruelty, our Lord in express terms re- 
veals. " Ought not this woman, being a daughter of 
Abraham, whom Satan hath bound lo these eighteen 
years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day 1 n 
v. 16. We read, too, of " one possessed with a devil, 
blind, and dumb." Matt. xii. 22. The last act of these 
fiends was always, when permitted, a cruel one : they 
" rent," or " threw down" their victims, when depaiting, 
though restrained from fatally injuring them. Thus it 
was with the man in the synagogue, who had a spirit of 
an unclean devil, which testified, in evident terror, to our 
Lord's divinity ; for he " cried out with a loud voice, 
saying, Let us alone ; what have we to do with thee, 
thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy 
us 1 I know thee who thou art : the Holy One of God. 
And Jesus rebuked him, saying, Hold thy peace, and 
come out of him. And when the devil had thrown him 
down in the midst, he came out of him, and hurt him 
not." Luke iv. 33, 34, 35. When Paul, through the 
abundance of revelations vouchsafed to him, was in dan- 
ger of becoming puffed up, a chastening hand was laid 
on him, by giving Satan power to afflict his body, in 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



67 



some way not particularized. He calls it " a thorn in 
the flesh ; the messenger of Satan sent to buffet me." 
2 Cor. xii. 7. It was grievous, for he thrice besought 
the Lord, that it might depart from him : it was visible, 
and humbling to human pride, for he gratefully mentions 
it to the praise of the Galations, that it did not lessen 
their regard for him, or their reverence for his mission. 
"Ye know how, through infirmity of the flesh, I preach- 
ed the gospel to you at first : and my temptation, which 
was in my flesh, ye despised not, nor rejected ; but re- 
ceived me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus." 
Gal. iv. 13, 14. 

In all these, and many other instances, we find, that 
the power of Satan, to whatever extent it is carried, is al- 
ways cruelly oppressive: Peter testifies of our Lord Jesus, 
that he " went about doing good, and healing all that 
were oppressed of the devil." Acts x. 38. But griev- 
ous as were the sufferings that Satan inflicted on the 
bodies of those over whom he had liberty to tyrannize, 
they were as nothing compared with what he can do 
when assaulting the mind. We do not here speak of 
such as knowingly act upon his vile suggestions, but of 
those who are the unconscious, or defenceless objects 
of his covert attacks. On this subject the book of God 
does not furnish us with descriptions of many individual 
cases, it rather shows us the machinery at work, and 
enables us, each from his own experience, to judge of 
the universal results. There is not an impulse of our 
nature, nor a faculty of our minds, nor an inclination of 
our hearts, — there is not a duty, there is not an enjoy- 



68 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



ment, there is not a trouble, but Satan both can and will 
lay hold of it to tempt, to harass, to oppress our souls. 
Hence, from age to age, every believer, how great so- 
ever his privileges, and how happy soever his experi- 
ence, must often take up the apostle's language, and 
secretly confess, that " we that are in this tabernacle, do 
groan, being burdened." 2 Cor. v. 4. And the nearer 
a Christian endeavours to follow the steps of Paul, in 
active employment for the Lord's cause among men, the 
more surely will he have to join in his testimony, who 
spoke so touchingly of his inward trials, serving the Lord 
with all humility of mind, and with many tears, and temp- 
tations." Acts xx. 19. 

In what manner Satan afflicted the affectionate Peter 
is fully detailed : and no one who loves the Lord Jesus, 
can for a moment doubt, that the agonies of his mind 
were far greater and more intolerable than any bodily 
suffering whatever could possibly have been. He was 
grieved to hear his adored Master predict the desertion 
of his disciples, and said, "Though all men should be 
offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended." 
Matt, xxvi. 33. Our Lord, in reply, assured him, that 
before the cock next crew he should thrice have denied 
him ; and Peter, as yet little aware of the power of his 
invisible adversary, and his own miserable weakness, 
reiterated the confident declaration, " Though I should 
die with thee, yet will I not deny thee ;" v. 35. St. 
Luke records that the Lord also addressed him, " Simon, 
Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he 
may sift you as wheat;" Luke xxii. 31.; thus plainly 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



69 



declaring whose was the cruel work, and when, after 
forsaking that gentle, loving Master, leaving him in the 
hands of his foes, and cautiously, at a safe distance, 
stealing after, to watch what should become of him whom 
he had just declared he would follow to prison and to 
death, the too confident servant was led by the devil to 
deny that he even knew his Lord, and to confirm the lie 
with oaths and curses : how dreadful must have been 
his feelings at the moment — how agonizing the tortures 
of his conscience, when the look of his compassionate 
Lord, suddenly turned upon him at the crowing of the 
cock, brought his sin home to his bosom with all its ag- 
gravations ! He could not fall at the feet of the captive, 
he could by no possibility approach him through the 
phalanx of weapons that hemmed him in. He could not 
cause the voice of his passionate supplication to reach 
that patient ear ; nor could he hear from the beloved lip 
the word of pardon. Probably the countenance turned 
upon him with that heart-breaking look, was already 
bruised by the ruffian stroke of his persecutors ; and, 
though we may fairly believe that the power of God, 
acting without a word spoken, at that moment drove Sa- 
tan from his diabolical work in the mind of Peter, with 
what unmixed anguish of soul must the apostle have re- 
called his cruel desertion, and insulting denial of his 
blessed Master : while John, who had professed nothing 
more than others, was boldly exposing himself to the 
peril of a recognition in the midst of the judgment-hall 
All had forsaken Jesus and fled, "that the Scriptures 
might be fulfilled 5" and for this no Satanic influence 



70 



OF EVIL spirits: 



was necessary. The weakness of human nature, wholly 
unassisted by divine strength, would suffice to hurry a 
handful of unarmed men from the presence of a hostile 
band, with weapons and torches, who had taken captive 
their leader, the root of all their confidence. This panic 
over, John was enabled instantly*o return and to tread, 
as near as he could approach him, the steps of his Lord ; 
so presenting a contrast to Peter's treachery, which made 
the latter at once inexcusable and doubly odious in the 
eyes of the unhappy culprit himself. To us the story is 
most important : it Was Satan's hour, as the Lord had de- 
clared. The prince of this world came, and had nothing 
in Him ; but in every one of us, he has enough to fur- 
nish a broad ground for any temptation that he may 
choose to bring ; and the ferocious cruelty of his dealing 
against the heart and conscience of the poor weak fish- 
erman, at that season of bitter sorrow and irreparable 
bereavement, may teach us a lesson of continual watch- 
fulness and prayer, that we may be able to resist the 
wiles of the devil. 

Cruelty is altogether a satanic quality ; it could not 
exist but for him. God is love, and all that God made 
was innocent, lovely, loving, till sin entered in, to defile, 
and Satan got power to destroy. In testimony to this, 
we have the predictions that point to the period when 
Satan shall be bound, and earth be wholly freed from his 
influence. Thus cruelty in all its forms shall disappear. 
" Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither 
shall they learn war any more." Isaiah ii. 4. " The 
wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall 



SATANIC CRUELTY. 



71 



lie down with the kid ; and the calf, and the fatling, and 
the young lion together, and a little child shall lead them. 
And the cow and the bear shall feed, their young ones 
shall lie down together ; and the lion shall eat straw like 
the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of 
the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the 
cocatrice's den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all 
my holy mountain." Isaiah xi. 6 — 9. Such will be the 
consequence of removing the originator of all wicked- 
ness, the instigator of all cruelty from the earth, and re- 
establishing the reign of love, 



l 



VI. 



SATANIC ACTIVITY. 



" The angel of the bottomless pit," is called Abaddon, 
or Apollyon, a destroyer, (Rev. ix. 11,) "and in the work 
of destruction his activity is indeed great. When we 
reflect on the extent of our globe, on the number of its 
inhabitants, — an ever changing, ever increasing popula- 
tion — during almost sixty centuries, and the vast varie- 
ties of mind, temper, disposition, and circumstances that 
prevent the history of any one among them from being 
the history of any other : when, too, we remember that 
of all these multitudes not one has escaped the tempta- 
tions of the devil, and that the main bulk of the whole 
have been doing his will, promoting his interests, and 
acting in harmony with his general design, in the face of 
all the evidences that crowd around them to the being 
and power of a holy, just, and beneficent God, — we 
surely must discern the characteristic of amazing activ- 
ity, in him who keeps so mighty a host true to his inte- 
rests,, and blind to their own. 



SATANIC ACTIVITY. 



73 



When Noah preached righteousness to the men of his 
generation, and verified his warnings by preparing before 
their eyes the ark which was to preserve all flesh that 
did not perish in the coming deluge, he made not a sin- 
gle convert to his doctrine : and the angel of the bottom- 
less pit swept off the whole generation of men into his 
own abode, one family only bein^ reserved. Scarcely 
was that reserved family re-established on earth's sur- 
face, when he beguiled the godly patriarch into an act 
of intemperance ; and this transgression the enemy also 
turned to such advantage, that it laid a third part of his 
progeny under a malediction, of which Satan well knew 
how to avail himself for further mischief. He fastened 
on the posterity of Canaan with peculiar tenacity ; and 
plunged them into every abomination. So far as the 
Bible traces their history, we find it one of perpetual 
crime and suffering ; and at this day, their condition, 
physical, moral, and spiritual, is a blot on the name and 
nature of man. What prodigious activity has he shown, 
and how extensively, how unremittingly have the rulers 
of the darkness of this world debased and afflicted th<5 
children of Canaan ! 

Shern had a blessing, and Japheth also, which Satan 
could not hope to reverse ; but against each of their 
races he has prevailed in a signal manner, and to this 
day he glories in the triumph achieved. From Shem, a 
single family was chosen, to be blessed above all the na- 
tions of the earth, and to be a universal blessing. To 
them were committed the laws and the oracles of God ; 
through them alone was He revealed, and his will made 
7 



74 



OF evil spirits: 



known to the world ; and above all, of them was to come 
that seed of the woman, promised even in the hour of 
man's transgression, who should bruise the serpent's head, 
and finally destroy him and his works. The history of 
Israel is a continued history of satanic diligence : he led 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, into acts of most sinful dis- 
simulation ; Sarah, into tyranny and injustice ; Rebecca 
and Leah, into most^ross deceit. In them he indeed 
exhibited himself as the father of lies ; and in the sons 
of Jacob, proved himself the " murderer from the begin- 
ning." He stirred up the king of Egypt to destroy their 
progeny, by oppression, and by bloodshed ; and to resist 
the delivering hand of the Lord, until the waters of the 
Red Sea swept the whole mighty host of Egypt at once 
into hell. He then followed the rescued people through 
the wilderness, exciting them to every species of provo- 
cation that might compel the Lord to destroy them ; and 
succeeded even in drawing them to forsake the wor- 
ship of their own God, the Lord of heaven and earth, for 
that of devils. While Moses was absent, receiving from 
Jehovah the law which had been promulgated with such 
fearful majesty but a few days before from Mount Sinai ; 
and while the mountain yet smoked with fire from heav- 
en, Satan drew them into idolatry the most gross ; even 
surpassing that of the Egyptians ; for what they worship- 
ped was the mysterious, though irrational creation of God, 
while the Israelites paid divine homage to what, but the 
day before, had dangled from their own ears. The ter- 
rible example made, did not reclaim them ; they went 
on to transgress, and were soon drawn into an active par- 



SATANIC ACTIVITY. 



75 



ticipation of the idolatrous sin of the Canaanites, whom 
they had been commanded for that very sin to destroy. Ba- 
laam had no power to curse Israel, but he prevailed by 
Satan's subtilty, to make them curse themselves. After 
many generations had passed away, each exceeding the 
former in iniquity, the revolt became so grievous, that 
ten out of the twelve tribes were cast off; delivered up 
to themselves and to Satan, and whither he has conduct- 
ed them, or where they now abide, no man knoweth. 

The two that were left, instead of taking warning by 
their dreadful fate, went on to provoke the Lord to jeal- 
ousy, until they too, in righteous though reluctant judg- 
ment, were delivered into the hands of their enemies for 
severe chastisement : and this had such an effect on 
them, that, as a body, all the wiles of the devil have not 
prevailed again to involve them in the guilt of idolatry. 
This, which had been the powerful engine of Satan for 
so many ages, now failed ; and did he therefore abandon 
the hopeless taste of inviting them to rebellion? No : 
his craft, — which may the Lord speedily and for ever 
confound ! — discovered another mode of rendering void 
the gracious purposes of God towards them : and he 
gradually substituted for the immutable, perfect law of 
Jehovah, the commandments of vain, foolish men: he 
first encumbered, then superseded the written word, by 
means of traditions, which, being reduced to writing, 
usurped the place of Holy Scripture ; and by that means 
so completely blinded the eyes, and hardenened the heart 
of the chosen people, that when, at the appointed time, 
the Deliverer, the Messiah, the Lord whom they looked 



76 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



for, suddenly came, they despised, rejected, hated, and 
crucified him ! 

For this, destruction, terrible destruction, came upon 
them : and alas ! not to the pages of the Bible, but to 
the streets of our own cities, the hovels of our own vil- 
lages must we turn, to know what, through the hateful 
devices of the devil, has befallen Israel, — to see how 
the Lord hath dealt with the dearly-beloved of his soul. 
The contemplation is enough to weigh down the most 
rejoicing spirit, in bitter grief and despondency : but, 
blessed be the Lord ! this dispensation of wrath is well- 
nigh passed away. " Thou shalt arise, and have mercy 
upon Sion ; for the time to favour her, yea the set time is 
come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and 
favour the dust thereof." Psalm cii. 13, 14. 

When the Lord Jesus appeared among the people, 
who for many centuries had eagerly looked for his ad- 
vent, he chose out twelve men to be the witnesses of 
his mighty works, the companions of his laborious path, 
the privileged intimates of his merciful bosom. Of these, 
Satan fixed on one, took up his abode in him, transform- 
ed him into his own image, and wrought in him to be- 
come the betrayer, and murderer of his Master. The 
reading through anyone of the four Gospels, with a con- 
tinual reference r to the part that Satan was acting all 
along, will give an awful idea of his indefatigable dili-* 
gence. 

We now come to Japheth ; his posterity, reckoned 
among Gentiles, as having no part in the very peculiar 
advantages belonging to this branch of Shem, were re- 



SATANIC ACTIVITY. 



77 



ceived into participation of their rich privileges, and indeed 
into their place altogether, until the indignation against 
them should be accomplished. Grafted into the good 
olive, (Rom. xi. 17,) they became living branches : and 
though Satan might exult in the total ruin of Israel, the 
destruction of the holy city, and desolation of the good- 
ly land, he had the mortification of seeing that Christ had 
yet a church, though Israel was not gathered ; (Isaiah 
xlix ;) and that his word would run and be glorified 
throughout the world ; to the ends of the earth, and in 
the isles of the sea. He therefore set himself to defile 
and destroy the Gentile, even as he had done the Jewish 
Church : and two of his stale devices were found effect- 
ual here. By means of oral traditions, abundantly fal- 
sified, he set aside the Scriptures : and so having made 
the commandments of men more valid than the com- 
mands of God, he contrived by their means to bring in 
idolatry : not under its real title of idol worship, or devil- 
worship, but on the principle of the golden calf, pro- 
claiming a feast to Jehovah, while eating and drinking, 
dancing and rejoicing, in honour of the manufactured 
abomination of their own device. To such an extent did 
he succeed, that out of the whole mass of the Gentile 
Church, occupying the place of the Jew, and with pious 
horror trampling him under foot, only a very small, un- 
known, or where known, persecuted and butchered rem- 
nant, could be found, who did not far outdo the Jew, in 
the worst of his iniquities. 

But the Bible remained ; and some were found to read 
it : and through the obstinate fidelity of the scorned, de- 
7* 



78 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



tested Jew, this new counterfeit of Christianity, with all 
hell at its heels, could not falsify the blessed text. By 
its means, the faith of God, never extinguished, fully re- 
vived, and spread abroad, and occasioned a great fall- 
ing off from Popery, to Christ. Here was a fresh call 
on the indefatigable diligence of Satan : he responded 
to it, by bringing in as many heresies, and by effecting 
as many divisions as he possibly could, among those 
who held aloof from the idolatrous system ; in the hope 
that he should yet be able so to arm it again with tempo- 
ral pow r eiv as to crush the little flock of Christ within its 
gigantic jaws. In this position he now stands, working 
among the three branches of the human family, with the 
angry zeal of one, who knows that his time is very short* 
The descendants of Canaan he keeps in bondage of 
body and soul, the most galling, the most degrading that 
man can submit to ; and until within a short period, he 
had power even over a truly enlightened Christian na- 
tion, to make them active agents in perpetuating, yea* 
in aggravating the horrors of his yoke, on the necks of 
their sable brethren. Shem's principal representatives, 
the chosen, highly-favoured children of Jacob, are yet 
wholly blinded to the great truth which they have convey- 
ed to us ; and with the books of the Old Testament in their 
hands, and with the deepest reverence for all that Moses 
and the prophets have written concerning Christ, their 
eyes are withheld from recognising the substance of the 
shadow which they so cherish : and with the view of the 
water of life flowing across their path, they perish in un- 
slaked thirst. The fiction with which Satan has long 



SATANIC ACTIVITY. 



79 



deceived so large a proportion of nominal Christendom, 
is still sustained ; and up to this time he keeps his ground, 
in defiance of increasing light on all sides ; so that we 
only now and then, hear of an individual rescued from 
the dominion of that blasphemous cheat, and enabled to 
see the snare coiled around him ; while full as many, 
brought up in the doctrine and worship of the true God, 
turn aside unto fables, and believe the lie. When we 
consider that of all these multitudes, and the myriads be- 
side who have not been specified, every single individual, 
requires the vigilant superintendence of some subtle 
spirit, to continue his delusion, to harden him against the 
truth, and even against the pleadings of his own natural 
reason, and the surrounding evidences of a power, good- 
ness, holiness, that he refuses to acknowledge, we may 
partly conceive what active duty is required of each sev- 
eral angel among the fallen host : and how prodigious 
must be the diligence of their leader, ever seeing, and 
directing such a complicated work. 

In this instance alone, we have gone beyond the track 
of Scripture history ; but not that of prophecy. The 
Bible sets forth what should come to pass ; and we look 
at what has occurred, and what will yet occur, before 
our eyes. The prolonged bondage and wretchedness of 
Canaan's race, the unbelief, dispersion, and continued 
degradation of Israel, and the great apostacy from the 
Christian Church, with its duration and consequences, 
are all most exactly foretold. And Satan, as " the god 
of this world," " the prince of the power of the air," " the 
spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience," 



50 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



is distinctly shown to be their governor, until, by the op- 
eration of the Holy Ghost, they are delivered out of his 
hand, and translated to the kingdom of God's dear 
Son. 



VII. 



SATANIC KNOWLEDGE. 

There is a wisdom peculiar to the powers of evil 
whereof the apostle speaks : " This wisdom descendeth 
not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish ; " James 
iii. 15 ; and there is a knowledge gained by close, con- 
tinued observation, apart from any divine aid whatever, 
and which fits a man to deceive and defraud his neigh- 
bour. In this, we may believe Satan abounds ; and we 
are quite sure that he has the power of communicating 
it, because the scriptures distinctly say so. He can en- 
able his servants to prophesy, but not true things : John 
saw an unclean spirit proceed out of the mouth of the 
false prophet. Rev. xvi. 13. He can endow them with 
miraculous powers ; as witness Pharaoh's enchanters, 
and the predicted apostacy of him, " whose coming is 
after the workings of Satan, with all power, and signs, 
and lying wonders;" 2 Thess. ii. 9; and who, under 
another name, is described as he that " doeth great won- 
ders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on 
the earth, in the sight of men ; and deceiveth them that 



S2 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



dwell on the earth, by the means of those wonders which 
he hath power to do in the sight of the beast." Rev. xiii. 
13, 14. The heaven here spoken of, is, of course, the 
upper region of our atmosphere ; for to the heaven of 
God's presence, Satan cannot extend his influences ; . 
however, he may, by some mysterious mandate, be made 
to appear there, as we have already noticed. By devilish 
wisdom he may devise many crafty plans, and by devilish 
power carry them into most destructive operation : and 
it is important to consider this point, lest we fall into the 
very common snare, of despising and neglecting what we 
are bound most vigilantly to watch and to guard against. 

Men, by accurate observation of the phenomena of 
God's works, and tracing effects to their causes, some- 
times make marvellous discoveries ; and by a judicous 
application of the knowledge acquired, by analogical 
reasonings, fit combinations, and often by apparent ac- • 
cidents, occurring in the course of their curious inves- 
tigations, they produce results that bear the character of 
amazing inventions. Yet how limited, how clouded, 
how defective, how utterly insignificant is the widest 
sphere of man's laborious observation, compared with 
what Satan can take in at a glance. The painful calcu- 
lations of the astronomer, arrived at after years of sleep- 
less nights, and requiring probably, as many more studi- 
ous days to render them intelligibly credible to others, 
are simple matters of common observation to him. Those 
hidden laboratories, where the elements in mystery and 
darkness work, are so far open to him as created intelli- 
gence is permitted to explore them ; and he certainly 



SATANIC KNOWLEDGE. 



83 



knows our frame far better than we ourselves know it. 
We have the direct, explicit, reiterated testimony of God 
himself, that Satanic influence could quench the sight, 
close the hearing, fetter the tongue, paralyze the limbs, 
distort the body, madden the brain, and impart to man 
the force of a powerful, ferocious beast. Instances of 
all this have been adduced from scripture, in the prece- 
ding sections ; as also the marvels wrought, as in the 
case of the Egyptian sorcerers, probably by the applica- 
tion of Satanic skill, in what we call chemistry, natural 
history, and other branches of science. We may doubt, 
or rather deny his ability to raise a tempest ; for the 
stormy winds fulfil God's word : (Psalm cxlviii. 8 ;) 
but he can at least do more than Columbus did, when 
by calculating and foretelling an eclipse of the moon, 
he terrified the poor ignorant natives into compliance 
with all his demands. 

An instance of his subtlety occurring a few years 
since, and attested by unimpeachable evidence, may 
illustrate this. The writer had it from one who was on 
the spot ; and it has also been published. The late 
Lady Hester Stanhope, it is well known, fell into a 
snare of the devil, abjured her faith, and lived among 
the mountains of Djourni as an eastern princess, wholly 
divorced from all former ties, not only to her country, 
but to her God ; she affected a knowledge of futurity, 
peculiar to those who practise witchcraft. Her house 
was visited by many strangers, including Englishmen ; 
and they were hospitably entertained. At the time now 
alluded to, some zealous Christians occasionally took 



84 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



up their temporary abode with her ; the Rev. Lewis 
Way, Joseph Wolff, and others, who earnestly longed 
to lead into the fold this wandering sheep and her infi- 
del-household. This, of course, would raise Satan's 
opposition in no common degree ; for the smallest por- 
tion of good leaven lodged in that lump might work the 
ruin of his kingdom in a place where every inch of ter- 
ritory is an important possession. Among the members 
of her establishment was a Dewish, a pretender to su- 
perior knowledge and sanctity, a teacher and worshipper 
of false gods, therefore of devils : held in esteem by 
Lady Hester, and in great awe and admiration by her 
dependants. This man's influence could not co-exist 
with that of a Christian minister; and though it does 
not appear that he took any part in resisting them, Satan 
contrived so to establish his character as to seal up his 
followers in deeper darkness than before. A tremen- 
dous earthquake buried Aleppo in ruins : the city was 
overthrown, and the inhabitants perished. Situated 
many miles distant from the scene of devastation, with- 
out the possibility of any human communication, and 
indeed before it took place, this Dewish openly pro- 
claimed that Aleppo was destroyed. In that advanced 
stage of the subterranean process, an observant being 
could doubtless tell that the crisis was at hand ; — 
could point the spot where, from circumstances or- 
dered of God, it was evidently to burst : and thus by 
Simply using the tongue of an ungodly man to convey 
the intimation, he established that man's claim to a pro- 
phetic spirit. It was much talked of at the time, and 



SATANIC KNOWLEDGE, 



85 



questioned by some who would neither admit that a 
divine revelation was made to so evil a character, and 
for no good end, or that Satan has power to discover the 
yet unrevealed purposes of God. We admit both these 
objections, yet the tale is true ; and on this ground it is 
perfectly explicable. 

And on this principle we may account for securing 
revelations of future, or very distant events, by dreams 
or otherwise, where they often tend to foster a danger- 
ous superstition, or to strengthen belief in a false doc- 
trine. Such things have come to pass within the 
knowledge of some who may read these pages. Inti- 
mations have been given of a death, or other occurrence, 
and mentioned also by the party receiving the impres» 
sion, hours before it was possible for intelligence to ar- 
rive : sometimes at the very moment the circumstance 
took place ; and instances could be named where Popery 
has at once been embraced on the strength of such jug- 
gling devices of Satan. A person apparently in the 
soundest health may be told by another, seemingly in- 
spired, that within such a period he should die ; and the 
prediction may be literally accomplished. In many 
cases, aneurism for instance, an organic disease, works 
its way for a long time without producing any sensible 
external effect : but Satan marks, and calculates, and 
confidently pronounces what, when the event comes to 
pass, is regarded as an oracle of God. That He can 
and does graciously warn and instruct his servants, both 
" in dreams and visions of the night," and in various 
other ways, we cannot for a moment doubt ; neither 
8 



ss 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



would we approach by a single step the awful crime of 
even ignorantly attributing to evil powers what may be 
the gracious intimations of the Holy One : we merely 
notice some illustrations of the Scripture assertion, that 
intercourse may be held with " familiar spirits," and 
witchcraft practised, and supernatural knowledge acquir- 
ed by diabolical aid. 

Three score years render a clever man shrewdly ex- 
perienced and worldly wise, if he have passed them in 
carefully looking about him with a view to his own in- 
terests. What, then, must be the advantage to Satan 
of nearly six thousand years' observation of all that con- 
cerns our race ? The stupendous intellect of an angel, 
faculties of which we can form no conception except 
from their mighty effects ; enough of daring to brave, 
and enough of malignity to persecute " the Mighty 
Father, the Everlasting God, the Prince of Peace," 
and to aid all of these, an ally already engaged on his 
side within the bosom of every child of man. Such is 
our adversary the devil : such is that roaring lion who 
goeth about, seeking whom he may devour ; and shall 
we be lulled into security, despite the awful admonitions 
which the Holy Ghost hath given, because it has become 
fashionable to despise his power, disbelieve his interfer- 
ence, and make light of his name? 

But, apart from supernatural knowledge, there is a 
wisdom which Satan imparts, by means of those sugges- 
tions that every one among us can testify he has power 
to insinuate into our minds. The apostle was speaking 
of that external worldly religion which is consistent with 



SATANIC KNOWLEDGE. 



87 



" bitter envying and strife " in the heart. Where these 
are allowed, he bids us " glory not, and lie not against 
the truth," for the wisdom in which such persons boast 
themselves " descendeth not from above, but is earthly, 
sensual, devilish." Some have, erringly, compared the 
mind of an infant to a clean sheet of paper, on which 
good or bad may be written at will ; this is wrong ; for 
the paper is impure, and blotted from the very first, and 
scribbled over with all evil ; but, so far as wisdom and 
knowledge are concerned, the sheet is certainly blank, 
until reason begins to unfold itself ; and Satan is eagerly 
on the alert with his subordinate fiends, to impart that 
which cometh from beneath. It is a solemn considera- 
tion that every idea conveyed to a child's mind must be 
from one of these sources : man can originate nothing : 
he may imbibe the notions of others, but they too must 
be sought for under one of the heads named by the 
apostle : the wisdom that cometh from above, which is 
pure and peaceable, or the wisdom that cometh from be- 
neath, which is satanic. Of the latter class was Ahitho- 
phel's wisdom ; in a good cause, his plan of carrying on 
the war would have been sound counsel ; but being 
brought to aid the cause of treason, rebellion, parricide, 
it was devilish. Satan suggested it, and God turned it 
into foolishness. 2 Sam. xvii. 14. 

The wisdom taught by our adversary is always oppo- 
sed to the truth ; it is a knowledge that puffeth up, and 
makes those who possess it fools — " For my people is 
foolish, they have not known me : they are sottish 
children, they have none understanding : they are wise 



ss 



OF EVIL SPIRITS. 



to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge." 
Jer. iv. 22. And this must be unlearned : "If any man 
among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him 
become a fool that he may be wise. For the wisdom 
of this world is foolishness with God ; for it is written, — ■ 
He taketh the wise in their own craftiness ; and again, 
The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they 
are vain." 1 Cor. iii. IS, 19, 20, The Egyptians were 
fully replenished with this infernal wisdom, when plan- 
ning to diminish the people of Israel by destroying the 
male children, they said, " Come on ; let us deal wisely 
with them," Exod. i. 10. These, and similar passages, 
clearly showing, that the wisdom of this world emanates 
from the god of this world, are calculated to prove to us 
the danger that besets the path of such as are bent on 
acquiring knowledge apart from godliness. They have 
a master at hand, ready and able to teach them as much 
as human understanding may grasp, and sure to clothe 
with every attraction the bait which he has found to be 
so efficacious in bringing souls into his net ; but the 
price of his lessons is such, that the man who strikes 
that bargain is bankrupt forever* 



VIII. 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 

Whence comes it that, in proportion as men are ob- 
viously under the influence of an unrenewed heart they 
seemed disposed to make light of the solemn reality 
which we are considering? Why do they most question 
or despise the enemy's power, when giving the plainest 
proofs of his unresisted dominion over themselves] Our 
Lord has furnished us with a clue to unravel the mys- 
tery : he says, in direct reference to it, " When a strong 
man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace ; 
but when a stronger than he shall come upon him, he 
taketh from him all his armour wherein he trusted, and 
divideth his spoils." Luke xi. 211, 22. Man is born in 
a state of rebellion against the supreme authority of his 
sovereign king ; and likewise in such a condition of 
mental and spiritual darkness, that he cannot be brought 
to see himself as he is, until divinely illuminated. He 
cannot comprehend the plain meaning of assertions re- 
peated again and again in the volume to which, as a 
8* 



90 



OF EVIL SPIRITS * 



whole* he perhaps yields his assent, but which, in its 
details and its personal applications, is probably still a 
sealed book to him. St. Paul describes man as being 
" carnal, sold under sin ;" Rom. vii. 14 ; and again he 
says, " the carnal mind is enmity against God ; for it 
is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." 
Rom. viii. 7. This characteristic of disobedience be- 
longs to the whole human race, however reluctant they 
may be to acknowledge it. Indeed, the scheme of re- 
demption necessarily hinges upon the fact, that man had 
offended God, and could not deliver himself. We also 
know in what way he was originally brought into this 
condemnation : " By one man's disobedience many were 
made sinners;" Rom. v. 19; and Satan is expressly 
set forth as the ruler of the disobedient, in that impor- 
tant passage which should never be out of our minds ; 
" And you, who were dead in trespasses and sins, 
wherein in times past, ye walked according to the course 
of this world, according to the prince of the power of 
the air, the spirit that now worheth in the children of 
disobedience ; among whom also we all had our 
conversation in times past in the lust of our flesh, fulfil- 
ling the desires of the flesh and of the mind ; and were 
by nature the children of wrath, even as others." Eph. 
ii. 1-3. Here we have it laid down as an axiom that 
those who are in their natural state of disobedience, 
those who still walk according to the course of this 
world, are under the dominion of Satan, possessed by 
him, since he works in them until the finger of God 
ea-sts him out. When, therefore we find men of unre- 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 



91 



newed spirits making light of the power, and even hint- 
ing doubts of the existence of Satan, while they de- 
nounce as childish the declarations of others concerning 
him, who have felt within themselves that mighty con- 
flict — the overcoming of the strong man, taking away 
the armour wherein he trusted and dividing the spoils, 
what does it prove but the necessity for increased ear- 
nestness on our part in declaring the reality of what 
Satan for his own sake, would represent as a fiction 1 
So long as the natural man remains ignorant or incred- 
ulous of the fact that he is himself a palace of Satan, he 
will not throw open the door of his heart to the Deliverer 
who stands and knocks at it : so long as the believer 
can be induced to forget the strong testimony of God to 
the enemy's restless designs and efforts, he will leave 
the door so unguarded as to endanger the re-entrance 
of its former master, to the clean-swept and garnished 
habitation. Surely then, it is a point of great moment 
with the enemy to lull our minds, and banish as far as 
he can our salutary dread of him ; and hence what 
some, smarting from the bitter conflict, have recorded 
for the warning and encouragement of others, is stigma- 
tized as weakness or insanity. Assuredly he who dared 
to face, to taunt, and to tempt the Lord Jehovah him- 
self, deserves a higher rank than that assigned to him 
by such deceived commentators — the rank of a nursery 
hobgoblin ! 

Another very important fact bears upon the same 
point : Satan has no compulsory power over man. Let 
him do his utmost, he cannot compel any human being 



92 OF EVIL spirits : 

to trangress ; he can only suggest, stimulate, provide 
occasion, and work in the children of disobedience to 
accomplish their own ruin. If we were helpless ma- 
chines it would be different ; but an act of volition on 
our part is necessary to constitute actual sin against 
God. Eve thought to cast the whole burden of guilt 
from herself upon the serpent ; and if he had forced the 
fruit down her throat, contrary to her will, no doubt 
she would have stood guiltless ; but she was a con- 
senting party, and so are we in every advantage that 
the devil obtains over us. Even the heathen Gentiles 
who never heard of a divine revelation, have a law writ- 
ten in their hearts ; a conscience accusing or else ex- 
cusing them ; (Rom. ii. 15 ;) and among us who is there 
able to plead actual compulsion or any thing beyond a 
temptation so strong perhaps as to appear irresistible, 
because he did not at the moment lay hold of the pro- 
mise annexed to a precept that none ever followed in 
vain. " Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." 
James iv. 7. It is our resistance that Satan dreads ; he 
knows we can put him to flight if we detect and face 
him : therefore his step is noiseless, his movement 
stealthy, and his battery masked, 

It is evident that our Lord's incarnation shook the 
kingdom of Satan upon earth in a peculiar manner ; 
but without leaving the direct testimony of Scripture, 
and hazarding conjectures where the least error may 
lead to very dangerous results, we cannot say much on 
that subject. This we know, that the evil spirits ex- 
pressed great terror at his approach, deprecating his in- 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 



53 



terference, and crying out against the exercise of a 
power which they with one voice acknowledged. The 
seventy disciples, also, having been sent forth, returned 
again with joy, saying, " Lord, even the devils are sub- 
ject unto us through thy name. And he said unto 
them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. 
Behold, I give you power to tread on serpents and 
scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy : and 
nothing shall by any means hurt you. Notwithstand- 
ing in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto 
you, but rather rejoice because your names are written 
in heaven." Luke x. 17 — 20. This certainly implies 
a great blow inflicted on the visible kingdom of Satan 
among men ; but that its extent was limited by the 
area to which the Gospel spread, seems also clear from 
the case of the seven sons of Sceva, (Acts xix. 13 — 16) 
who took upon themselves like some others, to exercise 
in the name of the Lord in whom they did not them- 
selves believe. " We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul 
preacheth." To which the unclean spirit replied, 
" Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are ye V 
and instead of obeying the unauthorized command to 
come out of the man, he gave him strength to leap 
upon and overcome all the seven pretenders, so that 
they fled from the house, naked and wounded. But 
though we cannot define either the precise nature or 
extent of the curb laid down upon the enemy by the 
first advent of our Lord, it is certain that a great change 
took place shortly after in the manifestation of satanic 



94 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



influences, which assumed more of a spiritual and less 
of a physical character, so that cases of obvious pos- 
session and witchcraft became less frequent, gradually 
disappearing before the advancing light of the Gospel. 
In our day they have apparently ceased, and with them 
in a great measure, the belief in their having ever 
existed, while doubts that give the direct lie to the in- 
spired Scriptures are started, listened to and canvassed 
with a grievous insensibility of the gross insult thus 
put upon the divine Author of that Book. Satan knows 
better than we do the extent of our power over him : 
the weakest believer is more than a match for him and 
all his angels, and would be able to prove it if brought 
to the test in the sight of men : therefore Satan lurks 
in ambush, forbearing to show himself openly as of old, 
lest he should draw forth the dormant energy of the 
Christian, inducing him to unsheath the sword that 
has slumbered in the scabbard until its master forgets 
that he holds such a weapon. The enemy indeed seems 
to be preparing for his last campaign against the church, 
by inducing such an oblivion of his history and features, 
that when he advances again she will not recognise him 
as the old serpent ; while among the ungodly he pre- 
vails to have his existence so utterly disbelieved, and 
his name converted into a jest, that he may work in 
them to any extent. They will obey his worst im- 
pulses as the dictates of their own wisdom, and exhibit 
as honourable trophies of liberty and independence, 
the heaviest fetters than he can rivet on their enslaved 
minds. 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 



95 



We may then safely assert that a limit exists, beyond 
which the power of Satan and his crew cannot pass ; 
and that it is known to us where that limit lies. Our 
blessed Lord disclosed it, when he said to Peter, " Si- 
mon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you, 
that he may sift you as wheat : but I have prayed for 
thee, that thy faith fail not." Luke xxii. 31, 32. It is 
our faith that effectually baffles his strongest efforts, as 
St. Paul declares, " Above all, taking the shield of faith, 
wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts 
of the wicked." Eph. vi. 16. And in a case of pos- 
session, where Jesus cast out a Devil which his disci- 
ples had vainly tried to expel, when the latter asked the 
Lord " Why could not we cast him out?" he answered, 
"Because of your unbelief." Matt. xvii. 19, 20. It is 
evident that man, being himself the lawful captive of 
Satan, and naturally inclined to follow his suggestions 
and to do his bidding, has nothing in himself calculated 
to oppose any effectual resistance to his power ; and 
it is only as Christ, the conqueror of Satan dwells in 
him by faith, influencing his desires, and strengthening 
him with strength in his soul, that many may venture to 
face so terrible a foe. All other means of defence are 
utterly vain : Satan knows no fetter in his actings among 
men, but that which Christ has thrown upon him ; and 
there is nothing so sure to drive the sinner to seek 
refuge in his Saviour, or to keep the believer close to 
him, as the clear comprehension of this momentous 
truth, that Satan, " going to and fro in the earth, and 
walking up and down in it," meets no restraint but 



96 



OF EVIL SPIRITS S 



where he meets Christ enthroned in the heart of a ran- 
somed sinner. 

These hinderers of Satan's work of destruction, which 
he, " a murderer from the beginning," John viii. 44, is 
ever seeking to carry on and to extend, are the people 
of God : they occupy through the reconciled blood of 
the cross, that position in the divine favour which man 
was originally created to enjoy, but which Satan per- 
suaded him to forfeit. They are a little flock, gathered 
out from among the immense community of the adver- 
sary's willing bondslaves, and from a kingdom as yet 
scarcely visible, scattered up and down, and divided, 
by his craft, into many portions. Of course, the usur- 
per's object is two fold : First, to strengthen his au- 
thority within his own domain, so as to place every ob- 
stacle in the way of the enlargement of the Redeemer's 
kingdom, by the accession of souls delivered from his 
thraldom, and next to weaken the little band of his suc- 
cessful opponents ; to lure them back, if it may be, into 
his chains ; if not, to harass, to persecute, to destroy 
them from off the face of the earth. To accomplish 
these ends, to break down the prescribed limits of his 
range, he wields every means within his reach ; his per- 
sonal power and subtlety, the legions of fallen angels 
who acknowledge him as their chief, and the people of 
this world, " the children of disobedience, 55 in whom he 
works, and in whom his work shows itself in an envious 
hatred of all that is good. If to dishonour God be, as we 
know it is, the end of Satan's designs ; and if to make 
man the instrument of so dishonouring his Creator, be, 



THE LIMIT OP SATANIC POWER. 97 

as we know it is, his delight ; how great must be his 
triumph, when he can involve the redeemed people of 
the Lord in such guilt, and turn, as it were, his prison 
bars into weapons of offence against his righteous captor. 
True, it may not again enclose the souls of the ransomed 
in his deadly grasp ; but knowing the words of the Lord 
Jesus to his disciples, " Herein is my Father glorified, 
that ye bear much fruit." John xv. 8. He strives to 
nip the tender blossoms, and to soil, if he cannot shake 
off, the half-ripened clusters of the true living branches. 
He contrives to mingle other motives with those which 
the Holy Spirit dictates ; and if he cannot cause them 
to predominate, so that they who have begun in the spi- 
rit, and run well for a while, are gradually drawn aside 
to follow the flesh, still he often weakens their hands, 
by presenting to them, in a strong and alarming light, 
their defiled and imperfect service, and persuading them 
that God has forsaken them. This he did of old, 
through his servants the false prophets, as the Lord 
speaks, " With lies ye have made the heart of the right- 
eous sad, whom I have not made sad." Ezek. xiii. 22. 
As he quoted Scripture to tempt the Lord Jesus, so he 
will do, to harass his disciples. Has not the servant 
of God often found himself assailed, in the act of teach- 
ing, exhorting, admonishing, whether with the lip or the 
pen, by some such passage as that, "What hast thou to 
do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest take 
my covenant in thy mouth V 9 Psalm 1. 16, coupled with 
the recollections of past sins, which are washed away 
by the blood of the Lamb, or the sense of present infir- 
9 



98 OF EVIL spirits : 

mity, which he knows he may carry to the throne of 
grace, where grace is promised, and help for every time 
of need, by him who hath made reconciliation for the 
sins of the people ; and " for in that he himself hath suf- 
fered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that 
are tempted." Heb. ii. 18. 

And he will, he does succour them. He has said, 
1 Resist the Devil and he will flee from you :" and has 
thereto added, " draw nigh to God, and he will draw 
nigh to you." James iv. 7, 8. Satan has great power, 
and he will stretch it to the uttermost in this branch of 
his work, tempting, harassing, discouraging, misleading 
the Lord's people : but there is a distinct promise given, 
that exhibits in a most cheering light the ever watchful 
care of the Most High over his poor children. " There 
hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common 
to man ; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to 
be tempted above that ye are able, but will with the 
temptation also, make a way to escape, that ye may be 
able to bear it." 1 Cor. x. 13. Paul was not exempt 
from these fiery trials : we find him continually alluding 
to them in his epistles, and not unfrequently naming the 
source whence he knew that all proceeded. In author- 
izing the Corinthian Church to forgive and comfort the 
offending, but now penitent brethren, who had, by his 
command, been delivered over for a time to Satan for 
needful correction, he assigns as a reason for thus again 
receiving him, " Lest Satan should get an advantage of 
us, for we are not ignorant of his devices." 2 Cor. ii. 11. 
And in the view of dangers to which those devices con- 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 



99 



stantly exposed them, he afterwards says, "I fear lest, 
by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his 
subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the 
simplicity that is in Christ :" then he goes on to explain 
that it is by means of evil teachers the enemy is most 
likely to assail their faith, " For such are false apostles, 
deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the 
apostles of Christ: and no marvel; for Satan himself 
is transformed into an angel of light; therefore it is no 
great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the 
ministers of righteousness." 2 Cor. xi. 3, 13-15. Then, 
being constrained by the injustice done to his character 
by these lying preachers, the apostle draws a picture 
of his sufferings, and the revelations vouchsafed to him, 
ending with the chastening dispensation, the " thorn in 
the flesh," with which Satan was permitted to afflict him 
permanently. The whole epistle to the Gallatians, as 
it turns on the subject, of mischief wrought by these 
"false apostles," is an exposure of Satan's wiles, and 
a testimony of the grief and anxiety wherewith he per- 
petually disturbed the zealous Paul. In the beautiful 
epistle to the Ephesians, the apostle informs all the 
doctrinal and practical instruction of the first five chap- 
ters, by that emphatic exhortation which cannot be too 
often recited. " Finally, my brethren, be strong in the 
Lord, and in the power of his might ; put on the whole 
armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against 
the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh 
and blood, but against principalities, against powers, 
against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against 



100 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



spiritual wickedness (or wicked spirits) in high (or heav- 
enly) places." Eph. vi. 10-12. He had comforted the 
Romans with the assurance that "neither angels, nor prin- 
cipalities, nor powers," — and none but evil ones could 
attempt it, — " should be able to separate him from the 
love of God in Christ Jesus ;" Rom. viii. 38, 39, thus 
always bearing in mind the limit of satanic power. To 
the Colossians he speaks with joy of having been deliv- 
ered "from the power of darkness;" Col. i. 13 ; and 
with holy exultation of the work of Christ, in that " hav- 
ing spoiled principalities, and powers, he made a show 
of them openly, triumphing over them in it;" (ii. 15,) 
and warns them of the devices that may be practised to 
beguile them into the worshipping of angels, and other 
unchristian practices. He tells the Thessalonians, " We 
would have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again* 
but Satan hindered us ;" (1 Thess. ii. 18,) thus proving 
that even in designing a journey, the enemy met and 
thwarted him : and in the second epistle he sets forth, 
chap, ii, the particulars of that fearful apostacy from the 
faith which has been well described as 4 Satan's mas-* 
terpiece," the rise, progress, and final destruction of the 
Papal Antichrist. The same apostacy is again foretold 
to Timothy. 1 Tim. iv, 1-3. The apostle also laments 
that Satan has already drawn some women aside after 
him, through idleness and tattling, chap. v. 13, 15, and 
urges Timothy to seek the recovery of such as still re- 
main in the snare of the devil, (2 Tim. ii, 25, 26,) and 
after recapitulating the evil wrought against him by those 
whom the enemy had stirred up, among professed fol- 



THE LIMIT OF SATANIC POWER. 



101 



lowers, he concludes with a triumphant assurance of his 
approaching, final victory and rest. The more we refer 
to those early days of the Christian dispensation, the 
better shall we be armed against what now is, and pre- 
pared for what is to come. It is indeed impossible ex- 
actly to measure the full extent of satanic power; but 
this we know, be it of whatever magnitude, the Lord 
hath set it bounds which it cannot pass : our most holy 
faith is the great appointed barrier; and in proportion 
as we diligently build ourselves up on that, we shall be 
safe. 



9* 



IX. 



SATANIC WRATH, AS THE END DRAWS NIGH. 



Hitherto, our principal concern has been with the 
history of the past : we now enter upon the no less 
certain history of the future. To suppose that God has 
vouchsafed to show unto his servants the things which 
must shortly come to pass, yet has shown them in such 
a way as to darken and perplex the honest inquirer, 
is to do Him great wrong. No, the word spoken is^ 
" Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that 
he may run that readeth it : for the vision is yet for an 
appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not 
lie : though it tarry ^ wait for it ; because it will surely 
come, it will not tarry." Hab. ii. 2 y 3. 

In various parts of scripture, but more particularly in 
the discousres of our Lord, shortly before his crucifix- 
ion, we are apprized of a period immediately preceding 
the commencement of Christ's glorious reign upon earth 
when tribulation such as the world has never yet seen. 



\ 



SATANIC WRATH. 



103 



shall prevail, if not universally, at least in those parts 
of the earth to which the general word of prophecy re- 
fers. Daniel thus speaks of it; or rather, the celestial 
Being who came to instruct Daniel: "At that time 
shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth 
for the children of thy people ; and there shall be a 
time of trouble, such as never was since there was a 
nation, even to that time." Dan. xii. 1. This is men- 
tioned as taking place at the time of the destruction of 
what we have every reason to believe is the Turkish 
empire ; and synchronizing with the duration of that 
empire, is the period of 1260 days mentioned in Rev. 
xii. 6, at the end of which we are told, " There was war 
in heaven ; Michael and his angels fought against the 
dragon ; and the dragon fought, and his angels." The 
whole passage has already been given, page 24 ; and 
the concluding words are terribly impressive, " Rejoice 
ye heavens, and them that dwell in them. Woe to the 
inhabiters of the earth and of the sea ! for the devil is 
come down unto you, having great wrath, because he 
knoweth that he hath but a short time," (verse 12.) 
The tribulation then, which excites the exclamation of 
" woe !" from the heavenly voice, is the work of Satan, 
permitted to plunge the world into one great final 
trouble; overruled for the purification of God's chil- 
dren, and the destruction of his enemies. In the mes- 
sage to the church of Philadelphia, which has endured 
to this day, the same period is probably referred to. 
" Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I 
also will keep thee from the hour of temptation which 



104 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell 
upon the earth," Rev. iii. 10. Such being the de- 
clared purpose of God, and Satan being the immediate 
inflicter of the terrible chastisement, let us, with awe, 
reverence, and godly fear, yet confident in Him through 
whom we shall be enabled to escape every snare, and 
to be " more than conquerors," approach this subject ; 
convinced that whatever he has caused to be written, 
was written for our learning. 

We are told by our Lord that " wars and rumours of 
wars, distress of nations and perplexity," shall usher in 
these fearful times. War is an element that Satan 
must exceedingly delight in; for it often cuts off in 
their sins more souls in a day than by natural death he 
can hope to grasp in many years. It fosters every bad 
passion; its origin is in the lusts that war in our mem- 
bers, desiring things that in God's providence are with- 
held from us, and wading to them through the blood 
of our brethren. A hateful, an accursed thing it is ; 
wholly irreconcilable with the gospel, or with any one 
precept of the gospel ; yet Satan prevails to make 
" wars and fightings " not only a branch of their policy, 
but even a matter of boasting among nations professedly 
Christian. One of his first achievements in this closing 
convulsion, will be to put the nations in battle array, 
one against another, and all against God. Earthquakes, 
famines, pestilences, fearful sights, and supernatural 
signs, domestic treachery, and public hostility, are all 
enumerated as concurrent evidences of the time when 
the three "spirits of devils," (Rev. xvi. 13,) shall have 



SATANIC WRATH. 



105 



entered upon their infernal mission. It were easy to 
speculate as to the precise nature of their operations, 
and the particulars of the tremendous battle field into 
which they will bring the deceived hosts ; but the sub- 
ject is too solemn for such guess-work ; it better be- 
comes us to receive with reverent thankfulness the in- 
timations actually given, and to wait patiently the ap- 
pointed time for making manifest what the Lord hath 
decreed. The "fearful sights "which are spoken of 
in such connexion as to make it plain they will be of a 
supernatural character, are here represented as the per- 
formance of miracle-working devils. The great Anti- 
christ, Popery, is described as him " whose coming is 
after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, 
and lying wonders, and all deceivableness of unrighte- 
ousness ;" (2 Thess. ii. 9 ;) and though, in a measure, 
this has been characteristic of the Papacy from its first 
rise, still we are led to expect a very great accession of 
devilish power at that time, when the Lord is approach- 
ing to destroy the Deceiver with the brightness of His 
coming. There is, so to speak, an antagonist "coming " 
of Popery described when the Lord himself comes to 
judge and to reign : when the Dragon, the Beast, and 
the false prophet, each contribute a missionary devil, 
invested with extraordinary powers, to tempt the kings 
and nations of the earth to battle against the Lord God 
Almighty. Great indeed must be the liberty given to 
the evil One when thus far he will prevail ; and that he 
lacks only liberty to accomplish it is clear enough. 
When leave was granted him to afflict Job, we have 



106 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



seen how his herds, flocks, servants, houses, children, 
and health passed away, as it were, in a moment : 
" like a rolling thing before the whirlwind." Let Satan 
therefore, receive a temporary power to convulse our 
globe, and what fearful "earthquakes" will ensue? 
Let the ripening harvest be delivered up to his disposal, 
and " famine " will stalk abroad in forms never before 
witnessed ; while the " pestilence " in his fierce, malig- 
nant hand, will transform the healthiest population into 
heaps of loathsome corruption. 

God can arm his spiritual creatures with a terrible 
power over mortal life. The destroying angel who 
smote the Egyptians, is an instance of the rapid move- 
ment with which a multitude may be mown down ; and 
it is remarkable also in being not a promiscuous slaugh- 
ter, like that of Sennacherib's army, but a careful selec- 
tion made from every family in every house. An angel, 
too, smote the people of Israel when David had number- 
ed them, the description of whose proceedings is awful- 
ly grand. ] Sam. xxiv. 26. And in the next verse we 
are told, " David saw the angel that smote the people ; " 
therefore to resolve it, as some attempt to do, into a 
figurative mode of expression, is unwarrantable : it was 
a real angel of God ; and even such was Satan before 
he fell ; and what a holy angel can do by divine com- 
mand, that can the foul apostate also do by divine per- 
mission. 

But a far more perilous feature of these predicted 
times of trial, is the seduction to be practised. Satan 
understands the varieties of the human character ; he 



SATANIC WRATH. 



107 



knows there are many whom open persecution would 
rouse rather than intimidate, and for them, and for God's 
true people, he has snares in reserve. He can make his 
own murderous acts appear as the righteous judgment 
of the Most High. In the Revelation we are told, that 
the Papal Beast " doeth great wonders, so that he 
maketh fire to come down from heaven on the earth in 
the sight of men," Rev. xiii. 13 ; and that he deceiveth 
them that dwell on the earth, by means of those mir- 
acles which he hath power to do. We may naturally 
conclude, that his object is to assume divine authority 
for what he does, by bringing the destructive element 
down, as when the Lord rained fire and brimstone upon 
the cities of the plain ; for even so he wrought to terrify 
Job, while he stripped him of his possessions. 

Domestic treachery, arming kindred hands, is also 
predicted — Luke xxiv. 16 ; so that " a man's foes shall 
be they of his own household." This is a very ancient 
device of Satan : he first rendered Eve the deadliest foe 
of her husband and of her whole posterity, by leading 
her to transgress : he then guided the hand of the first 
man born into the world to slay his brother : and history, 
sacred and profane, is but a record of his successful 
plots against the peace of families and of kingdoms, by 
means of every species of treachery. Here, as of old, 
he will make his delusions avail to draw the deluded into 
all cruelty and bloodshed. His terrible craft is able to 
persuade a man that falsehood is truth, and that in slay- 
ing the righteous, "he doeth God service." Hence the 
snare against which the Lord most fully and emphati- 



108 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



cally warned his first disciples, and against which he 
also arms us — false Christs, and false prophets. We 
know that just previous to the destruction of Jerusalem, 
when, no doubt, Satan hoped to involve the Christians in 
the general ruin, several deceivers assumed the name 
of Christ, and drew away many after them : it is plain 
that, in some way, these pretensions will again be put 
forth ; and we have reason to look steadily at that which 
is already written, lest any seeming revelation, contra- 
dictory to what is given to be our guide unto the end of 
the world, should be contrived, to deceive, if it were 
possible, the very elect. The general expectation, pre- 
vailing more and more throughout the church, of our 
Lord's promised coming, will doubtless furnish the cun- 
ning adversary with an additional means of annoyance 
and destruction. Already, and for centuries past, has 
he proclaimed, " Behold ! he is in the secret chambers ! " 
to the eternal loss of unnumbered souls who, believing 
the lie, have worshipped an idol enclosed in a box, upon 
the Popish altars ; deifying the senseless paste in Christ's 
stead, and perishing in their sin. Literally and distinct- 
ly is a " false Christ " held forth for public worship, by 
the " false prophets " of Rome, to this day ; and no one 
is justified in questioning the express fulfilment, to the 
letter, of all that our Lord has foreshown. Here too, there 
is warrant enough in the Old Testament to satisfy the 
most incredulous. When the king of Israel was to be 
enticed to battle at Ramoth Gilead, where he fell, a " ly- 
ing spirit " possessed the whole company of his prophets, 
so that they all predicted his success, in the name of 



SATANIC WRATH. 



109 



the Lord. He, " who was a liar from the beginning," 
put into their mouths this unauthorized prediction ; even 
as he tempted the old prophet of Bethel to deceive the 
man of God who came out of Judah : and in like man- 
ner the Jewish people were continually transgressing 
through the perfidious words of their ungodly teachers, 
saying, '* Peace, peace," where there was no peace. 
There seems to be a prevailing belief among Christians, 
that the enmity of the last day will break forth in the 
form of open, outrageous infidel defiance of God and 
his Christ ; and so it probably will to a great extent : 
but surely not exclusively so : Satan will not wholly give 
up his old craft of forging God's name and authority for 
deeds most desperately subversive of His laws, and in- 
sulting to His majesty. " That old serpent" retains 
the designation, and, no doubt, the deep, subtle plausi- 
bility which it implies, to the very moment when an elect 
angel lays hold on him, and binds him, and shuts and 
seals him up, "that he should deceive the nations no more, 
till the thousand years should be fulfilled." Rev. xx. 3. 
And again, " When the thousand years are expired, Sa- 
tan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go out to 
deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the 
earth" — verses 7, 8. Such considerations would ren- 
der us more watchful against forms of error, creeping 
with serpent-like guile into the Church itself, and steal- 
ing on the unguarded points of the citadel, where, as no 
open enemy is descried, no adequate defence is pre- 
pared. 

The extraordinary movement that, some ten or twelve 
10 



110 



OF EVIL SPITIITS : 



years since excited universal attention, when the Scotch 
Church in London was considered to be the scene of 
miraculous manifestations of divine power, wore very 
much the aspect of a preparatory manseuvre of the ene- 
my. Some things took place that it is very hard to ac- 
count for, without admitting the aid of a supernatural 
power ; and to suppose that power to have been of God 
is impossible, when we remember with what an awful 
heresy it was connected. That party set up indeed a 
" false Christ " — a Christ compounded of Popish and 
Socinian errors, a blasphemous counterfeit of Him who 
was holy, harmless, undefined, and separate from sin- 
ners. The manner of bringing in this perilous deceit, 
•was exceedingly like what the Scripture ldads us to ex- 
pect of Satan's latter day devices ; and it is remarkable, 
that just as the Lord placed an evident barrier to stay 
the farther spread of this delusion, another masked bat- 
tery against the truth of Christ's gospel, subversive, at 
once, of His atoning and his mediatorial all-sufficiency, 
was opened at Oxford, and has worked, and is working 
to the same end with the Irvingite heresy, only with a 
different kind of assumption. In the former attempt, 
the gospel was to be set aside by a new revelation, ac- 
companied with attesting signs and wonders, as from 
the hand of its Almighty Author : under the latter sys- 
tem, men claim a power, in virtue of the commission 
delivered to the apostles, of new modelling all things : 
thinking " to change times and laws " — Dan. vii. 25, 
after the manner, and on the same ground as the Papacy, 
that convicted child of the devil : and into which the 



SATANIC WRATH. 



Ill 



whole thing will probably soon resolve itself, in the face 
of all men. These small droppings are at once a por- 
tent and a sample of the coming shower ; and we shall 
do well so to regard them, and to take timely shelter 
under the shadow of the immovable rock, 

The distinguishing mark of Satan's false Christs is, 
that they are only half saviours ; man is, in some way, 
to make up the deficiency; and so, seeking to be justi- 
fied by the law, he falls from grace — Gal. v. 4. Satan 
well knows how sure is that word, which received its 
primary accomplishment on the day of Pentecost. " It 
shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the 
name of the Lord shall be delivered" — Joel ii. 32'; and 
when the final " great and terrible day " shall draw 
near, he will put forth all his subtilty to deceive men, 
that they may call on some name which can afford no 
deliverance, like Baal's priests ; or, as did the sons of 
Sceva, call unbelievingly on Him who is nigh to help 
only when the prayer is breathed from the lip of faith. 

Nor is his craft in this matter confined to the exhibi- 
tion of something manifestly different from the truth: 
there is a way of preaching even the pure doctrines of 
the Bible, that will in a great measure neutralize their 
effects. The apostle could declare, " we preach net 
ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord ; " and so they did, 
as we may perceive from the recorded sermons of these 
first inspired teachers, in the book of Acts : the sum and 
substance of their discourse was, " Flee from the wrath 
to come." They showed the terrors of that wrath, and 
they held forth Jesus Christ as the only refuge from it ; 



112 



OF EVIL SPIRITS I 



they told of his death and resurrection, his power in 
heaven and in earth, and the certainty of his coming to 
judge and to reign. " Be it known to you," was their 
proclamation to the Jews, " that through this man is 
preached unto you the forgiveness of sins ; and by him 
all that believe are justified from all things, from which 
ye could not be justified by the law of Moses." Acts 
xiii. 38, 39. To the Gentiles they declared, " To him 
give all the prophets witness, that through his name, 
whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of 
sins ; " (Acts x. 43 ;) and this mode of preaching is ac- 
cording to the mind of God : He owns it, and blesses 
it ; and by its simplicity, which in the wisdom of this 
world is called " foolishness," he saves them that be- 
lieve. 1 Cor. i. 21. There is nothing Satan dreads 
more than a ministry of this stamp ; accordingly he draws 
men away from the homely backward path, fills them 
with notions of their own sufficiency, persuades them 
that originality is a great gift, much to be coveted, and 
that intellect is the right door to men's souls. He points 
out here a Paul, there an Apollos, and in another pul- 
pit a Cephas : whose respective hearers presently dis- 
cover, each that his own minister is the very model of 
ail that a minister ought to be, and his style of preach- 
ing precisely what is most needed. Hence we hear 
whispers among the separating congregations, not of 
conscience-stricken sorrow for sin, not of awakened 
praise for salvation, not of deep desire for the continued 
presence of him who has been (or ought to have been) 
visibly set forth crucified among them ; but * What a 



SATANIC WRATH. 



113 



splendid discourse ! How great Mr. was to-day ! 

What eloquence, what imagery, what clear views he 
takes ! Certainly our pastor has no equal among his 
brethren.' Hence that system of sermon-hunting, which 
as Cecil well remarked, is little better than fox-hunting ; 
hence the Sabbath desecration, the carriage called out 
to bear its owner to some favourite place of worship ; the 
horses robbed of their assigned season of repose, the at- 
tendant domestics either excluded from, or cruelly cur- 
tailed in their share of religious ordinances : and so, too 
often, carnality is insensibly substituted for spirituality. 

This ought not to be : an adversary hath done it, and 
the same adversary well knows what immense advantage 
he must gain by the system, when he succeeds in draw- 
ing one of these popular men aside from the straight 
path. Many of those who think they only follow the 
teacher, because he follows Christ, will be betrayed into 
still following him, when he has turned his back upon 
the Lord. Satan first infected man with his own diabol- 
ical disease — pride ; and the whole turn of the gospel of 
Christ is to provide an antidote for that venom. And 
first, the preaching of the cross is a cross to the preach- 
er, if he do it aright; for he must be content to forego 
much of what is highly esteemed among men, and to be 
nothing that Christ may be all. Line upon line, line 
upon line ; precept upon precept, precept upon precept ; 
the wearisome repetition of that one story, " Jesus Christ 
came into the world to save sinners," that our warning, 
" He that believeth not the Son shall not see life ; but 



10* 



114 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



the wrath of God abideth on him : 99 that one direction, 
" Repent, and be converted, that your sins may be blot- 
ted out : " such a mode of dealing with a world dead in 
trespasses and sins, will never give the preacher undue 
pre-eminence among men, but it will glorify his master, 
and save souls. 

Where now shall we go for this heaven-inspired 
strain] Many such ministers there doubtless are, whose 
rule of teaching is "Christ exalted, and self abased ;" 
but we may more readily find the thing which Satan fears 
in the pages of John Bunyan,or John Flavel, than from 
the lips of eloquent pastors in our own day. If Paul 
should come to hold a visitation of what we have reason 
to believe was once a part of his own wide diocese, sure- 
ly he would be constrained to put the searching ques- 
tion, " Are ye not carnal V 

We are now writing of Satanic wrath as his permitted 
day shortens, and his wrath does not always vent itself 
in explosions of rage. It works sometimes in secrecy 
and darkness ; fierce, indeed, and cruel always, but nev- 
er devoid of skilful cunning to direct it. There is as 
much of his wrath in the speaking of smooth things, and 
the prophesying of peace to those with whom the Lord 
has a controversy, as in the greatest tumult of violence. 
Who shall tell the extent of that wrathful hatred against 
God and his fair creation, which prompted the bland in- 
sinuating lie, " Ye shall not surely die." Oh that min- 
isters and congregations would bear in mind, equally bear 
in mind how great a stake the enemy has in drawing 
away their minds from the unadorned simplicity that is 
in the doctrines of the cross. 



SATANIC WRATH. 



115 



But the doctrine of the crown is another which he 
now struggles with all his infernal might to suppress. 
A crucified Saviour, an atoning sacrifice, a mediating 
High Priest in heaven, he loathes to think on, or to suf- 
fer his bond-slaves to hear of ; but a reigning king, 
about to rescue the earth from all his usurpations, to 
plant his throne in righteousness in the midst of his peo- 
ple, to send forth his word from Zion, and his law from 
Jerusalem. This is the very knell of Satan's departure ; 
and to stifle the sound he will foster humility itself, any 
grace by the perversion of which he may hope to seal 
the preacher's lips on that fearful topic. For eighteen 
centuries he has heard the petition resounding on all 
sides, "Thy kingdom come;" and he cares not how 
often it is reiterated, (as witness the Papacy with its ev- 
erlasting repetitions of Pater-nosters) so long as men do 
not inquire into the nature of that coming kingdom, or 
watch for its approach. An imperfect Gospel he can 
tolerate, and in our day that is an imperfect Gospel 
which omits the great truth of a speedy manifestation of 
the Lord from heaven. The sound of his conqueror's 
chariot wheels is a fearful sound to Satan ; and know- 
ing that nothing will so surely turn the attention of the 
Church upon himself as the heralding of Christ's ap- 
proach, he will strike almost any bargain, of which a 
condition is the silencing of that ominous voice. 

In connexion with this part of the subject, we may 
call to mind the parable of our Lord, where he describes 
the proceedings of the unclean spirit, who has left for a 
time his habitation, as distinguished from that effectual 



116 OF EVIL SPIRITS I 

expulsion which God only can accomplish. " When 
the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh 
through dry places, seeking rest ; and finding none, he 
saith, I will return unto my house, whence I came out : 
and when he cometh, he findeth it swept and garnished. 
Then goeth he, and takelh to him seven other spirits, 
more wicked than himself ; and they enter in, and dwell 
there : and the last state of that man is worse than the 
first." Luke xi. 24 — 26. We may be assured that 
attempts at such re-entrance, under aggravated forms, 
into every person who may appear to have been deliv- 
ered from the power of Satan, will be made as the time 
shortens, and the enemy's rage increases ; and hence 
the cruel treachery that Christ's people must look for 
at the hands of their nearest connexions, and dearest 
companions. Many an Ahithophel will be found ; many 
a Judas to revolt from his friend, and to betray his mas- 
ter; and many an unsuspecting Christian will have to 
take up the prophetic complaint, "It was thou, a man, 
mine equal, my guide, and mine acquaintance ; we took 
sweet counsel together, and walked unto the house of 
God in company." Psalm lv. 13, 14. 

It is of the first importance that we should be prepar- 
ed not only for an outburst of Satanic malignity and cru- 
elty, such as was never before permitted to devastate 
our world, but also for a manifestation of Satanic poten- 
cy, such as men are fast losing all belief in. We do 
not give the enemy credit for possessing such powers as 
the word of God distinctly ascribes to him ; we are apt 
to fancy that the blow miraculously inflicted on him du- 



SATANIC WRATH. 



117 



ring the early years of the New Testament church, has 
crippled him forever ; and we therefore look for noth- 
ing more, in the things that are coming on the earth, 
than a peculiar readiness on the part of bad men, to act 
upon his cunning suggestions. The consequence of 
this unguarded state of mind will be, that when leaders 
appear assuming new ground, and confirming their as- 
sumptions by doing real marvels in our sight, we shall 
be tempted to receive them as Simon Magus was re- 
ceived of old, by the people whom he bewitched with 
his sorceries : " To whom they all gave heed, from the 
least to the greatest, saying, This man is the great pow- 
er of God." Acts viii. 10. Not a few of those who 
held out against the Irvingite heresy in the days of its 
success, did so, as they acknowledged, only because its 
apostles failed in performing any really miraculous work. 
Attempts were made to raise up the dying, and to re- 
vive the dead ; and their open failure cooled the zeal of 
some very anxious inquirers : should a similar delusion 
be brought forward, and such things actually effected, 
are we prepared to resist the evidence of sense, and to 
cling to the word of God alone 1 We shall be better 
armed for such a trial, by giving serious heed to what 
the Bible testifies in the passages here cited, and receiv- 
ing the predictions in their simple, literal acceptation. 

Popery is now heaping up its stately piles of archi- 
tecture throughout the land, fitted, no doubt, in their 
secret recesses, with a vast machinery for the exhibition 
of " lying wonders," on a grand scale, by which many 
will be snared and taken : but though a principal, still 



118 



OF EVIL SPIRITS. 



Popery is not likely to be the sole manifestation of Sa- 
tan in these coming horrors. Forms of errorless open- 
ly revolting than the gross idolatry of that system, but 
not less fatal to the soul if persisted in, will be supplied, 
for those who would hurl the anathema at an angel from 
heaven, if he dared to preach up the mass. Some will 
be led astray, but not finally ; for it is plainly said, 
" Some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, 
and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time 
of the end." Dan^ xi. 35. And to this the apostle 
seems to refer, where he says of the sins and judgments 
of Israel, "Now all these things happened unto them 
for ensamples, and they are written for our admonition, 
upon whom the ends of the world are come. Where- 
fore, let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest 
he fall." 1 Cor. x. 11, 12. No vain speculation should 
mix itself up with this solemn subject : It is one where 
each believer must seek instruction how to arm himself 
for the great battle, in which he may expect ere long to 
be engaged: the word of God alone, prayerfully studied 
and practically applied, will show to each of us the might, 
the wrath, and the purpose of our adversary. It will also 
show us how that adversary is to be met and conquered ; 
even by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of our 
testimony. 



THE DOOM OF SATAN AND HIS ANGELS. 

In the sentence pronounced upon the serpent, it was 
declared that the seed of the woman should bruise his 
head. A blow inflicted on the vital part indicates final 
destruction ; and in accordance with this, the apostle 
tells us that our Lord Jesus became partaker of flesh 
and blood, " that through death he might destroy him 
that had the power of death, that is the devil." (Heb. 
ii. 14.) We find the great enemy, first an angel, not^ 
keeping his holy estate, but becoming rebellious, trans- 
formed into a liar and a murderer, compassing the ruin 
of this beautiful creation, and drawing a creature, made 
in the image of God, into deadly transgression against 
his merciful and glorious maker. Still having occasion- 
al access to heavenly places, we find him availing him- 
self of it to accuse before God those whom he had tempt- 
ed into sin, and to resist the work of mercy towards 
man. Then, cast wholly out of heaven, we learn that 
he vents his great wrath upon the inhabitants of earth, 



120 



OF EVIL SPIRITS : 



and for a limited time plunges them in fearful woes. 
Lastly, the doom for which he knows himself to be re- 
served is inflicted ; and he, with all his legions of ac- 
cursed spirits are cast into a pit of sulphurous flames, 
there to abide forever and ever. 

The intimations given of this final judgment are many, 
and explicit. Jude, with whose words we commenced 
our proofs, in those words declares the end. " The an- 
gels that kept not their first estate, but left their own 
habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under 
darkness, unto the judgment of the great day." Jude 6. 
They are, themselves, perfectly well aware of what is 
coming upon them ; as St. James implies when speak- 
ing of a faith that works not by love, an acknowledg- 
ment of God's being, power, and justice, without any 
sense of redeeming mercy, any conformity to his will. 
" Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: 
the devils also believe and tremble." James ii. 29. 
They made the same admission themselves, when terri- 
fied by the sudden appearance of their dreaded Judge. 
The " legion " saw him coming ; — "And behold they 
cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, 
thou Son of God 1 ? Art thou come hither to torment us be- 
fore the time ?" Matt. viii. 29. And again the unclean 
spirit in the synagogue, — " Let us alone ; what have we 
to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth 1 Art thou 
come to destroy us ? I know thee who thou art, the 
holy one of God." Mark i. 24. On another occasion, 
one of the devils " besought him much that he would not 
send them away out of the country ; " (Mark v. 10.) 



THE DOOM OF SATAN AND HIS ANGELS. 121 

or as St. Luke expresses it, " They besought him that 
he would not command them to go out into the deep 
(Luke viii. 31 ;) by which must be understood the bot- 
tomless pit ; since, on having their request granted, they 
immediately entered the swine, and of their own accord, 
rushed down into the sea. 

Our Lord has foreshown their dreadful doom; in which 
all who remain under the dominion of Satan, must like- 
wise partake : " Depart from me, ye cursed, into ever- 
lasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." Matt, 
xxv. The constant contemplation of this their certain 
end, must greatly aggravate the malignity of evil spirits : 
nothing is so hardening as despair. Their sin was un- 
pardonable ; and Christ " took not on him the nature of 
angels," (Heb. ii. 16,) to workout for them the redemp- 
tion which in his infinite compassion he vouchsafed to 
achieve for their wretched victim, man. There could 
be none to tempt Satan into rebellion, as he tempted 
Eve to disobedience ; and how irritating must it be to a 
mighty, spiritual, angelic being, to see a creature formed 
out of the dust, redeemed from his power, at so vast a 
price as the blood of the incarnate God, while he, and 
the myriads of his companion spirits, are passed by — 
left to perish for ever ! We see with what horrible rage 
and cruelty he used the power, for a short time commit- 
ted to him, that the innocent Jesus might suffer. Most 
signally was he baffled! he came against Christ to tempt 
and seduce, and was repelled, put to shame, and driven 
away : he came against him to smite and kill, and in so 
doing was himself destroyed ; his usurped empire wrest- 
11 



122 



OF EVIL SPIRITS 



ed from him, the prey, for which he had so long toiled, 
taken out of his net, and the mortal bruise inflicted on 
his accursed head. Our blessed Lord, in the immediate 
prospect of his sufferings, said, " Now is the judgment 
of this world : now shall the prince of this world be cast 
out." John xii. 31. The result was certain, the tri- 
umph secured. He had before, in the rich success of 
the first Gospel missionaries, beheld Satan as lightning 
fall from heaven : (Luke x. 18:) now, in the contem- 
plation of his own death, " the travail of his soul," he 
saw him cast out from his last refuge, our earth, and 
about to sink into the lake of fire. 

The order of events, as regards this final casting out, 
is very distinctly set forth. YVe have already seen the 
predictions of that short period of great wrath, when 
Satan and his attendant devils shall try the world with 
unprecedented calamities, and gather its kings and cap- 
tains to battle against the King of kings, and Lord of 
lords. At this^ point, vengeance first overtakes him: 
his chosen instrument, the Beast, and the false prophets 
that wrought miracles before him, are taken, and cast 
alive into a lake of fire, burning with brimstone : (Rev. 
xix. 20 ;) and then follows the event to which the Church 
looks forward with such longing desire : <p And I saw an 
angel come down from heaven, having the key of the 
bottomless pit, and a great chain in his hand : and he 
laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the 
devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and 
cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and 
set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations 



THE DOOM OF SATAN AND HIS ANGELS. 123 

no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled : and 
after that, he must be loosed a little season." Rev. xx. 1 
1 — 3. This chaining and imprisoning of Satan during 
a thousand years, whether they be literal years, or pro- 
phetic years of days, and everyday a year, is most merci- 
fully not revealed to us, as the most encouraging support 
under the trials that precede it. Christ will then have 
taken to him his great power, and will reign, not as a 
preached but as a present Saviour and King. No lon- 
ger shall the perfidious enemy snatch away the seed of 
divine truth from the human heart, as now he does : 
(Matt. xiii. 19 :) no longer shall he prevail to sow his 
worthless tares among the true wheat of the Church, 
verse 39, his hateful presence, will no longer vex, nor 
his malignant power oppress the world. Yiolence shall 
cease ; M They shall not hurt nor destroy, in all my holy 
mountain: " (Isaiah xi. 11:) ignorance, superstition, and 
unbelief shall vanish ; " The earth shall be full of the 
knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." 

The creatures of Jehovah shall no longer be beguiled 
into tempting and dishonouring their Creator, by follow- 
ing after false gods, or setting up stumbling-blocks of re- 
bellious iniquity in their hearts, for " The Lord shall be 
king over all the earth : in that day, there shall be one 
Lord, and his name One." Zech. xiv. 9. It is impos- 
sible to conceive' the amount of happiness to be derived 
from the mere absence of Satan, even were no positive 
blessing to accompany the negative good : but since 
his capture and committal will be the result of His com- 
ing again into the kingdom whose right it is, we may 

i 



124 OF EVIL SPIRITS : 

well be glad, and rejoice in the prospect, and comfort 
one another with these words. 

This, however, is not a final casting out of our rest- 
less enemy : sufficient evil will yet lurk in some parts 
of the renewed earth for him to practise his old craft 
upon ; and he will have liberty so to do. " When the 
thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out 
of his prison, and shall go out to deceive the nations 
which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and 
Magog, to gather them together to battle." Rev. xx, 
7, 8. Who these nations are, or under what circum- 
stances they will at that period be placed, we cannot 
possibly say. It is idle, and worse than idle, for men 
to guess, to predecate, to dogmatize, on matters where 
the most learned has no other data to guide him, than is 
vouchsafed to any babe in a Sunday-school. We know 
that the Lord hath spoken it ; therefore we know that 
it shall come to pass. Satan's prison-door shall be 
opened, his chain removed, and immediately he will re- 
turn to his ancient work of deceiving men. It is apal- 
ling to observe with what fierce earnestness he is bent 
on this detestable employment. His hatred of man is 
ever breaking out ; and what must they expect to en- 
dure, who, through their rejection of Christ's gospel, 
doom themselves to be his companions and slaves for- 
ever ! Hell, as a place of flames and torments, " where 
their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched," is 
invested with mystery, that shrouds its terrors, and leads 
bold unbelievers to scoff at what they cannot compre- 
hend ; but hell, as manifested in the character and 



THE DOOM OF SATAN AND HIS ANGELS. 125 

actings of Satan, is a comprehensible and a fearful reality! 
To be condemned, even for a short time, to the exclu- 
sive society, and subjected to the despotic will of a per- 
son who utterly hates us, and by all means seeks our 
hurt, is an infliction that few would like to brave : but 
this is a helpless bondage forever and ever, to and with 
one who, as a powerful angel, must always be stronger 
than we ; and whose torments, while we partook of them, 
would perpetually incite him to tenfold ferocity against 
us, as a means of their great aggravation. 

Satan will succeed in his last expedition, so far as 
the deceiving, and consequent destroying of these na- 
tions is concerned ; whose number we are told, is as the 
sand of the sea. " And they went up on the breadth of 
the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, 
and the beloved city ; and fire came down from God, 
out of heaven, and devoured them. And the devil that 
deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brim- 
stone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and 
shall be tormented day and night, forever and ever.' , 
Rev. xx. 9, 10. 

Beyond this, the word of God does not lead us : the 
secrets of that burning pit are not revealed to man. The 
terribleness of divine wrath, in its unmitigated inflic- 
tions, no heart can conceive, neither may tongue essay 
to describe it. Some have spoken of the state of the 
lost, as though it was one where rage and blasphemy 
continually poured forth their despairing defiance of the 
Most High. It may be so, as regards the evil spirits, 
but Scripture leads to no such supposition respecting the 
11* 



126 



OF EVIL SPIRITS. 



ruined souls of men. Anguish most bitter, weeping, 
and wailing, and gnashing of teeth : a full appreciation 
of what has been rejected, and an agonizing conscious- 
ness of what is incurred — the total absence of hope, the 
blackness of darkness, to be known and felt forever and 
ever — these are a part of what we are told will be the 
portion of those who believe not ; the doom of such as 
will not obey. Let this awful glimpse of unspeakable 
and everlasting wo suffice ; and may the blood of Him 
who, through the Eternal Spirit, offered Himself with- 
out spot for our sins, be so applied to the soul of her 
who writes, and of every individual who reads these pa- 
ges, that they may never know, by experience, the terrif- 
ic reality of what, by faith, they are assured, is reserved 
for the enemies of the gospel of Christ, 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS 



I- 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 



In the great conflicts that man has to wage with the 
terrible enemy to whom he has sold himself, and who 
labours to keep, or to regain possession of every indi- 
vidual soul, so long as it inhabits the body, man has but 
one effectual help. Unaided and alone, God, manifest 
in the flesh, fought the battle of redemption : he alone 
paid the ransom, and from him alone is all strength, all 
succour to be derived. There is not in heaven above, 
or in the earth beneath, any created thing, capable of 
supplying a fraction towards the mighty price of man's 
deliverance, nor of contributing an iota of the power by 
which alone he can successfully fight the good fight of 
faith, and lay hold on eternal life. It is highly impor- 
tant to bear this in mind, because of the fearful abuses 
by which the adversary has prevailed to pervert the de- 
lightful truths that we are now about to investigate. The 
Papal apostacy, one of whose characteristics it is to 



130 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



" blaspheme them that dwell in heaven," (Rev. xiii. 6,) 
has established a system of angel-worship, interwoven 
with every part of its unholy fabric, and carried to such 
an excess that it has prevailed to drive the Church of 
Christ into an opposite extreme ; teaching them to shrink 
from, or to overlook the encouraging truths that tend to 
the glory of God ; and which are therefore changed into a 
lie by Satan, that in our anxiety to shun that lie, we may 
lose the consolations provided for us. 

Of what subsisted previously to the creation of this 
globe, we have but very dim intimations ; yet we know 
that angelic hosts looked on and rejoiced in the beau- 
teous work. This is conveyed in magnificent language 
in the book of Job, where the Lord enters into contro- 
versy with the doubting and complaining, but self-justi- 
fying sufferer. "Where wast thou when I laid the 
foundations of the earth ? declare if thou hast under- 
standing. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou 
knowest 1 or who hath stretched the line upon it? 
Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened 1 or 
who laid the corner stone thereof ; when the morning 
stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for 
joy V 9 Job xxxviii. 4 — 7. It is certain from this pas- 
sage, that beings, bright and holy, existed, with faculties 
to comprehend, and minds to rejoice in the manifesta- 
tion of God's power and goodness in creating this globe 
on which we dwell. They are called " the angels of 
God," (Gen. xxviii. 12,) " Holy angels," (Matt. xxv. 
31.) 

Michael seems, indeed, to be among the holy angels, 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 131 



what Satan is among the fallen spirits, a leader invested 
with great power ; and we find them personally oppo- 
sed on two occasions, — the first of which seems con- 
clusive as to his being, however high and glorious, still 
a creature, humble and obedient : " Michael the arch- 
angel, when contending with the devil, he disputed about 
the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing 
accusation, but said, the Lord rebuke thee." Jude 9. 
Peter applies the same argument, and seemingly alludes 
to the same event, when treating, as Jude does, of the 
presumptuous evil-speaking of ungodly men. " They 
are not afraid to speak evil of dignities ; whereas angels, 
which are greater in power and might, bring not railing 
accusation against them before the Lord." 2 Peter ii. 11. 
Here the same expressions are applied to Michael, and 
to angels generally. He is, however, of exalted rank, 
as the angel who talked with Daniel plainly declared, 
when alluding to the mysterious contest in which he had 
been engaged, together with other spiritual beings, and 
which has already been quoted. Michael is there des- 
ignated " One of the chief princes and the angel ad- 
dressing Daniel as a seer', calls him " Michael your 
prince." Dan. x. 13 — 21. Finally, when describing 
the consummation of all things, the angel says, " At that 
time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which 
standeth for the children of thy people." Dan. xii. 1. 
From all this we gather that Michael is one among sev- 
eral angelic beings, whom the Lord has seen fit to ele- 
vate above their fellows, and that as regards the concerns 
of our planet, he is probably the chief. The word arch- 



132 OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 

angel, occurs but once more in the Bible, and there we 
are told, " The Lord himself shall descend from heaven 
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with 
the trump of God." 1 Thess. iv. 16. But Michael 
is named again, as we have before seen, as heading the 
great battle against Satan, when " there was war in heav- 
en, Michael and his angels fought against the dragon ; 
and the dragon fought, and his angels." Rev. xii. 7. 

The most natural inference to be drawn from what 
the Lord has seen good to intimate to us, is that some 
special post is assigned to each one of the heavenly 
spirits ; and collectively we know what their office is. 
" Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to min- 
ister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?" Heb. i. 
14. One may, indeed, oversee the affairs of a kingdom, 
while another watches the slumbering baby in a cottage 
cradle, but be the office what it may, it is rendered ar- 
duous by the incessant opposition of the satanic hosts, 
who are forever crossing the path and thwarting the 
work of those ministering spirits, to say nothing of the 
perverseness of those who, though by the free mercy of 
God they are " heirs of salvation," still inhabit a body 
of death, tainted by corruption, opposed to holiness, and 
presenting, no doubt, a painful and a perplexing specta- 
cle in the eyes of their unseen friends, whose holy na- 
tures full of love, zeal, thankfulness, and perfect obedi- 
ence, must often shrink from the perverse iniquity of even 
the redeemed people of God. 

Yet we know that these loving ministers take delight 
in our prosperity : their zeal for the glory of God must 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 133 

necessarily cause them to rejoice in the subversion of 
Satan's- empire among men; and the knowledge that 
they possess of his object, the continual sight of his 
atrocious devices to promote that cruel object, and above 
all, the daily, hourly spectacle of souls passing from this 
stage of existence into a hopeless eternity, all tend to 
keep alive in their minds that compassionate feeling to- 
wards us which makes the welfare of every soul a matter 
of deep interest to him. Our Lord assures us that 
" there is joy in the presence of the angels of God, over 
one sinner that repenteth ;" (Luke xv. 10;) and there 
is no mistaking the affectionate tone of the angelic mes- 
senger who, with the glory of the Lord encircling him, 
greeted the shepherds, *' Fear not : for behold I bring 
you good tidings of great joy, v/hich shall be to all peo- 
ple ;" (Luke ii. 10 ;) nor that of the various angels who 
announced the Lord's resurrection to the women, " Fear 
not ye ; for I know that ye seek Jesus which was cru- 
cified. He is not here, for he is risen, as he said. 
Come, see the place where the Lord lay. And go 
quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the 
dead ; and behold he goeth before you into Galilee ; 
there shall ye see him : lo, I have told you." Matt, 
xxviii. 5-7. This is an exquisite picture of angelic 
power, glory, and tenderness combined. The angel 
who spoke was seated on the stone that he had rolled 
from the sepulchre's mouth : such was the dazzling 
splendour of his countenance, that it shone like light- 
ning ; and the armed soldiers of Rome " did shake and 
became as dead men." Yet how guilty, with what con- 
12 



134 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



descending indulgence, and mild assurance he encour- 
ages the poor terrified women, dilating upon the partic- 
ulars that were best calculated to inspire them with 
confidence and joy I We may return hereafter to the 
subject ; but at present it must not be overlooked as 
exhibiting in a most touching light, the angelic charac- 
ter. 

The first notice we have in scripture of the ministry 
of angels is an awful one. God " placed at the east of 
the garden of Eden, cherubims, and a flaming sword, 
which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of 
life." Gen. iii. 24. No doubt they who had sang to- 
gether and shouted for joy when earth arose beneath the 
hand of her divine framer, and the whole glorious fabric 
was completed and pronounced very good, were fre- 
quent visiters to man, encouraging and sharing with 
him the language of praise to their King ; and very 
terrible indeed to them must have been the spectacle 
of these favoured, beloved creatures, recently formed 
out of the dust, and exalted to such majesty, and en- 
dowed with such felicity, drawn aside by a device of the 
devil to revolt, and to bring a curse upon what God 
had blessed ; and their service in guarding the gate from 
the expelled offenders was a willing one ; for how could 
the Lord be insulted and they not moved to most indig- 
nant sorrow] But although we find them prompt to 
execute the terrible denunciations of his displeasure, his 
mercy to man excites their chief joy. We shall find 
many proofs of this as we go on; and while repudiating 
with horror the least approach to rendering them a par- 



THEIR EXISTENCE AND CHARACTER. 135 

fcicle of the honour due to God alone, we must be cold 
indeed not to feel a glow of thankful affection towards 
the high and sinless beings who sympathize with us in 
this our low estate of guilt and sorrow, who encamp 
around us to watch the movements of our deadly foes, 
and who long to welcome us into the heavenly mansions 
of safety and peace prepared for us by their Lord and 
ours. 



II. 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 



03iniscience belongs to God alone : He only is the 
Hearer of prayer, the Searcher of hearts, the sovereign 
Ruler of the affairs of man. To suppose that any cre- 
ated being may appropriate even the minutest portion of 
these high prerogatives of Jehovah, is nothing short of 
heresy, verging on blasphemy. Its dangerous tendency 
is plainly shown by the apostle, who says that the wor- 
shipping of angels, beguiles the Christian of his reward. 
Col. ii. 15. Therefore we have need to be very sober 
and circumspect, lest in treating of this most interesting 
subject, we be led, through inadvertence, into ascribing 
to the holy angels, any properties on which the ignorant 
and profane might ground an excuse for rendering to 
them divine honours. God has not seen fit to reveal to 
us to what extent the spiritual creatures, good and evil, 
who constantly surround us, can penetrate our thoughts. 
They, of course, can form a very accurate conclusion 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 137 

from what they see and hear, combined with their ac- 
quaintance with the past events of our lives ; but be- 
yond this we have no warrant for supposing that they 
know more than the Lord, for special purposes, is pleas- 
ed to reveal to them. 

One knowledge the angels do certainly possess, and 
that the very chiefest of all knowledge — they know 
God : and as the depths of the riches of His knowledge 
and wisdom are unfathomable, they evermore seek fresh 
acquisitions in that divine science. The apostle Peter, 
speaking of the mysteries of redemption, " the suffer- 
ings of Christ, and the glory that should follow," the 
preaching of the Gospel, " with the Holy Ghost sent 
down from heaven," adds, " which things the angels de- 
sire to look into." 1 Peter i. 11, 12. And that they 
do look with adoring joy upon the mighty work, is mani- 
fest from their joining in the heavenly song, " Worthy is 
the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, 
and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and 
blessing." Rev. v. 12. How far they may be employ- 
ed in overseeing the minute circumstances, by which a 
sinner is often brought to the hearing of the Gospel, 
by entering some particular place of worship, taking up 
some particular book, or other similar occurrences, we 
do not know : but this we do know, that there is joy in 
the presence of the angels of God, over one such re- 
penting sinner. The expression, " ministering spirits, 
sent forth to minister to them that shall be heirs of sal- 
vation," would lead us to suppose that the children of 
God, even previous to their effectual calling, are placed 
12* 



138 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



under the care of these bright and loving creatures, 
whose holy nature must often be deeply grieved at the 
iniquity of man ; knowing, as they do, the unspeakable 
immensity of the stake which he so daringly trifles with, 
and the infinite love of God, against which he so basely 
and insolently sins. 

There is a knowledge too, which, no doubt, is reveal- 
ed to the angels — that of the Lord's peculiar favour to 
certain individuals. Gabriel expresses this to Daniel, 
when about to communicate to him what the Lord had 
informed him of. M 0 Daniel, I am now come forth to 
give thee skill and understanding. At the beginning of 
thy supplications the commandment came forth, and I 
am come to show thee ; for thou art greatly beloved." 
Dan. ix. 22, 23. And again, on another occasion, " O 
Daniel, a man greatly beloved " — Dan. x. 11 ; and " O 
man, greatly beloved, fear not! v. 19. In addition to 
this, they are unquestionably endowed with very high 
degrees of discerning and discriminating knowledge. In 
that beautiful passage, where the woman of Tekoah 
with such singular eloquence and effect, pleads with 
David, covertly purposing to soften him towards his 
banished son, these expressions occur : — " The word 
of my lord the king shall now be comfortable : for as an 
angel of G od, so is my lord the king to discern good and 
bad :" and again, " My lord is wise, according to the 
wisdom of an angel of God, to know all things that are 
in the earth." 2 Sam. xiv, 37 — 20. This wise woman 
of Tekoah, whose wisdom appears to have been of a 
worldly description, and who was prompted by Joab, 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 139 

certainly flattered the king ; but there is no reason to 
suppose she flattered the angels, concerning whom we 
are led, on much better authority, to form a very high 
estimate. How exquisitely beautiful are her words, in 
relation to the Lord's reconciling mercies ! " Where- 
fore hast thou thought such a thing against the people 
of God ] for the king doth speak this thing as one which 
is faulty, in that the king doth not fetch home again his 
banished. For we must needs die, and are as water 
spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up 
again : neither doth God respect any person, yet doth 
he devise means, that his banished be not expelled from 
him verses 13, 14. The justness of this sublime 
picture of man's helplessness and God's rescuing power, 
gives weight to what this singular woman also said of 
angelic wisdom and knowledge. Paul, too, refers to 
them, when he says, " Though we, or an angel from 
heaven, preach any other gospel unto you, than that 
which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed." 
Gal. i. 8 : and again, " Though I speak with the tongues 
of jnen and of angels, and have not charity, I am be- 
come as sounding brass, and as a tinkling cymbal. " 
1 Cor. xiii. 1. 

But whatever difficulty we may find in ascertaining 
the extent of angelic knowledge, of the power of the an- 
gels we are taught to form most stupendous concep- 
tions ; or rather it is a power the greatness of which we 
cannot conceive. The terrible slaughter of the first-born 
in Egypt, was the work of one angel, and accomplished 
within so short a space of time, that the cry rose simu!- 



140 



OP THE HOLY ANGELS : 



taneously throughout the land. Another display of this 
awful power took place, when the army of Sennacherib 
laid siege to Jerusalem. " Then the angel of the Lord 
went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians, an 
hundred and fourscore and five thousand : and when- 
they arose early in the morning, behold they were all 
dead corpses." Isaiah xxxvii. 36. A hundred and eighty- 
five thousand warriors slain with a stroke, as they lay 
stretched securely slumbering in their tents, was a 
mighty achievement ; and in like manner the visitation 
provoked by David's sin in numbering the people, though 
it is called a pestilence, was effected by an angelic hand. 
" The Lord sent pestilence upon Israel, and there fell 
of Israel seventy thousand men. And God sent an an- 
gel unto Jerusalem to destroy it; and as he was destroy- 
ing it the Lord beheld, and he repented him of the evil, 
and said to the angel that destroyed, It is enough ; stay 
now thine hand. And the angel of the Lord stood by 
the threshing-floor of Oman the Jebusite. And David 
lifted up his eyes, and saw the angel of the Lord stand 
between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword 
in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem : then David 
and the elders of Israel who were clothed in sackcloth, 
fell upon their faces. And David said unto God, Is it 
not I that commanded the people to be numbered 1 
even I it is that have sinned, and done evil indeed ; but 
as for these sheep, what have they done ? let thine hand, 
I pray thee, 0 Lord my God, be on me, and on my 
father's house ; but not on thy people, that they should 
be plagued. Then the angel of the Lord commanded 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 141 

Gad to say to David, that David should go up, and set 
up an altar unto the Lord, in the threshing-floor of Or- 
nan the Jebusite. And David went up at the saying of 
Gad, which he spake in the name of the Lord. And 
Oman turned back and saw the angel ; and his four 
sons with him hid themselves. .... And David built 
there an altar unto the Lord, and offered burnt-offerings 
and peace-offerings, and called upon the Lord : and he 
answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of 
burnt-offering. And the Lord commanded the angel, 
and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof. 
At that time when David saw that the Lord had answer- 
ed him in the threshing-floor of Oman the Jebusite, then 
he sacrificed there But David could not go be- 
fore it to enquire of God ; for he was afraid, because of 
the sword of the angel of the Lord." 1 Chron. xxi. 
14 — 30. What a splendid vision is here revealed to 
us ! A creature of surpassing strength, glorious bright- 
ness, and probably of great magnitude, standing in mid- 
air, with a glittering weapon, the stroke of which was 
instantly mortal, stretched over the holy city, which lay 
in beautiful repose beneath an evening sky. In the act 
of smiting, the angel's hand was arrested, and he stood 
in suspense, the weapon still flashing in his grasp, to 
know what farther he should do : David had offended 
the Lord too deeply by listening to the suggestion of 
Satan, to be honoured with any direct communication ; 
neither was the angel permitted to address him, but 
through Gad the seer, who had announced the coming 
judgment on the land. The angel directed a sacrifice, 



142 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



and continued fully visible in that menacing position, 
so that the sons of Oman hid themselves from his terri- 
ble appearance. It was not until the smoke of the 
burnt-offering had ascended before the Lord, at once 
rendered and pronounced acceptable by the kindling of 
heavenly fire, that the dreaded sword was sheathed. 
Yet even so, its terrors remained so powerfully impress- 
ed on the mind of the king, that he dare not approach 
his temporary altar, from fear of the glorious being who 
still watched his proceedings. This is one of the 
glimpses afforded us of what is perpetually passing 
around, but which our eyes are holden from seeing. 
We talk of casualities, of epidemics, of contagious dis- 
orders ; but we see not the hands that with unerring 
fidelity deal forth each mysterious dispensation, accor- 
ding to the Lord's appointment. The same presumptu- 
ous folly that has clothed evil spirits with fantastically 
frightful grimace, has invested the holy angels with a 
puerile silliness of appearance, wholly at variance with 
every scriptural representation. Baby faces between 
a pair of bird's wings, destitute of bodies ; slim girls 
with long flowing ringlets, and pinions well feathered; 
these are the imaginary likenesses of things in heaven, 
which we are warned not to represent to ourselves ; 
and the terribleness with which the Lord, for his own 
glory, has invested these ministers of his, is wholly lost 
sight of. 

The angel who met Balaam in the way, was of a for- 
midable aspect. The poor beast, who showed a better 
feeling than the mercenary wicked prophet, saw him 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 143 

and turned aside each time, until the narrowness of the 
way preventing this, she fell down, and was cruelly chas- 
tised for it by her senseless rider, whom she was ena- 
bled miraculously to reprove. " Then the Lord open- 
ed the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of the Lord 
standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand." 
Numb. xxii. 31. The angel's address was very severe, 
and his look so alarming, that all Balaam's thirst for 
gold could not tempt him to advance, until he received 
distinct permission to do so. We may be assured that 
the spectacle of a hypocrite like Balaam, making use of 
the Lord's name to forward his own selfish unprincipled 
ends, and ready for filthy lucre's sake to call down a 
curse on God's people, or more effectually to destroy, 
by alluring them into sin, could not but be unsupport- 
ably odious to a holy angel, ever zealous to vindicate 
the honour of his glorious King; and to such a man, the 
face of a " ministering spirit" would be fearful indeed, 
if, like Balaam's, his eyes were opened to meet the in- 
dignant gaze of God's true servant. 

Angelic power was put forth to shut the mouths of 
the hungry lions, among whom Daniel was cast to be 
devoured. The prophet tells us so. " My God hath 
sent his angel, and hath shut the lion's mouths, that 
they have not hurt me." Dan. vi. 22. Daniel was 
indeed most peculiarly favoured by the ministry of an- 
gels, and by the intimate footing in which Gabriel ap- 
peared to place him ; while the prophet's deportment 
towards his celestial interpreter was beautifully humble 
and respectful : and in his communications, which have 



144 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS i 



more of a colloquial and confidential tone than any re- 
corded in the Old Testament, the angel certainly shows 
himself to be a powerful warrior and champion, contin- 
ually engaged in battle. " The prince of the kingdom 
of Persia withstood me one and twenty days : And now 
will I return to fight with the prince of Persia." It is 
for man they fight ; for rebel man, who is himself too 
generally fighting against God ; or at least neglecting, 
with wanton disregard, those interests over which the 
angels of the Lord tenderly watch. Against us are 
arrayed principalities and powers, the rulers of the dark- 
ness of this world, and Avicked spirits in high places : 
but in the unequal contest we have great and potent 
allies, whom the Lord Jesus has commissioned to serve 
us according to our need, in warding off, no doubt, 
many bodily dangers not less imminent than the jaws 
of the hungry lions were to Daniel, though often unseen 
and unsuspected by us. 

A simple student of Scripture, unacquainted with the 
received notions of poets, painters, and sculptors, who 
should undertake to portray an angel of God, would 
probably represent him under a very different aspect 
from any that we are accustomed to connect with the 
idea ; because we, the bond-slaves of custom, ever ready 
to be misled by vain traditions received from our fathers, 
and incapabje of independent thought, or rather indis- 
posed to it, adopt the prevailing error that saves us the 
trouble of reflecting, and content ourselves with gro- 
tesque devils, and namby-pamby angels. Surely both 
are, to mortal gaze, most terrible ! There are men 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 145 



upon earth, whose withering scowl of malignant ferocity, 
treachery, and reckless desolation of heart, may convey 
to the shrinking observer a faint idea of what must em- 
anate from the countenance of an evil spirit, " seeking 
rest and rinding none," " going to and fro in the earth, 
and walking up and down in it," for the sole purpose of 
venting his cruelty on mankind : but where shall we 
look for the likeness of an angel? Bountiful they must 
be, because all God's unblemished works are so ; and 
calm they must be, for holiness and happiness are always 
calm : but this earth, defiled by sin, and broken into 
helplessness, contains nothing to furnish us with a con- 
ception of the character that spotless purity and over- 
mastering power must impart to those who possess both. 
The expression of a very young and lovely infant's 
countenance, is the nearest approach that earth can 
make to heaven : but, alas, the taint is there, though as yet 
comparatively undeveloped ; and who could picture the 
feeble lump of clay arrayed in the terrors of a warrior of 
heaven ? 

Let us but examine of what class of his works the 
Lord principally speaks ; when answering Job out of 
the whirlwind, Jie sets before him a small part of the 
wonders that, even in this visible world, fling man into 
such a fearful distance of ignorance, obscurity, and con- 
tempt. The ocean with its proud waves, and secret 
springs, its garment of clouds, and swaddling band of 
thick darkness ; the horse, with his neck clothed in thun- 
der, pawing in the valley, rejoicing in his strength, mock- 
ing at fear, and swallowing the ground with fierceness 
13 



146 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



and rage. Behemoth, taking in a river with his eyes, 
and trusting that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth; 
Leviathan, making the deep to boil like a pot, with eyes 
like the eye-lids of the morning, esteeming iron as straw, 
and brass as rotten wood ; these are the works of the 
Almighty on which he chiefly dwells, when causing the 
patriarch to meditate on the greatness of his Majesty 
and glory : and we cannot doubt that he has clothed in 
more than thunder the forms of his celestial hosts, en- 
gaged as they constantly are in battle with myriads of 
mighty opponents. The effect produced on Daniel by 
the appearance of an angel, and on the sons of Oman ; 
on Manoah and his wife, and on the apostle John, who 
even after the vision of the Lord himself, and all the 
glories of heaven, was twice so overcome by the great- 
ness of his angelic companion, that he fell down at his 
feet to worship him, all, with many other instances, tend 
to impress us with the belief that an angel, however 
beautiful, is still exceedingly awful. He is the warrior's 
subject of a king, whose sovereignty is resisted, and his 
will opposed by the wretches whom he formed out of 
nothing : how can the servant's aspect be that of repose, 
so long as his adored Master is resisted, grieved, and 
wronged by the insolent rebels of earth and hell 1 No ! 
a victory has to be won, before the holy angels sheath 
their flaming swords, or lose the terrors of their stern 
and wrathful looks, now bent on every side to track the 
mazes of the insidious foe, and to repel him from the 
invisible boundary of the Lord's inviolable fold.- 

In speaking of angelic power, we must not exclude 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 147 



the property of actual, physical strength. The general 
opinion as to a celestial being, seems to exclude all that 
is material : but it is impossible to reconcile this with 
the facts recorded in Scripture. Shadowy beings could 
not have made themselves palpable to the touch of mor- 
tal hands, as when the angels forcibly drew Lot into the 
house, or when they led him and his wife and daughters 
from the city, or when Peter felt himself smitten on the 
side ; or in other instances, to be enlarged on as we 
proceed. A body perfectly tangible may become invis- 
ible, as our Lord, whose body we know to have been 
truly a human body in every respect, repeatedly proved; 
and that our insensibility to the presence of these minis- 
tering spirits, is the effect of blindness on our part, — prob- 
ably the consequences of our sin, — we learn from the 
prayer of Elisha, who, desiring to pacify the young man's 
fears, did not ask that a heavenly guard might be sent 
to assure him, but only that his eyes might be opened to 
see what was actually present. Our Lord says, that in 
the resurrection his people shall be " equal unto the an- 
gels." Luke xx. 36. Now, we know, to a certainty, 
that men will rise with their bodies : that this mortal 
shall put on, not immateriality, but immortality — 1 Cor. 
xv. 53 ; and if angels are incorporeal spirits, certainly 
there must be either an inferiority or a superiority to 
those with whom it is expressly said they shall be equal. 
Bodies like those which we now inhabit, in substance, 
they probably have not, although we have sufficient proof 
that all which we call the laws of nature, may be sus- 
pended or reversed at the divine will, without working 



148 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



any change in our natural frames : as in the case of the 
three Jews, who walked unharmed in the midst of the 
fiery furnace of Babylon — Dan. iii. 27; and the prophet 
Ezekiel, who was lifted up and borne through the 
air — Ezek. iii. 14 ; and Jonah, who remained uninjured 
for three days and nights in a place when in much less 
time, according to those laws of nature, not only would 
his life have departed, but the framework of his body 
become decomposed and utterly changed into corruption. 
Jonah i. 17. The skepticism of the human mind ren- 
ders us willing rather to explain away the most unequiv- 
ocal language into shadowy figures, than to submit our 
vain reason to the omniscience of God ; our shallow 
philosophy to his omnipotence : and though the most 
delicate petal of a tiny flower, or the tinted particle that 
our rude touch brushes from the butterfly's wing, cannot 
subsist without nutriment, conveyed by divinely-formed 
mechanism for its support, we are unwilling to think 
that when the Holy Ghost, in reference to the manna, 
says " Man did eat angel's food," Psalm lxxviii. 25, there is 
any ground given for supposing that angels are actually 
nourished by substantial aliment. We would start no 
new theory upon this subject ; neither will we receive 
any, howsoever firmly established on human authority, 
that will not stand the test of scripture. We believe 
that the unseen world is of a much more tangible quali- 
ty than is commonly supposed ; that angelic forms are 
not made of vapour, neither are they, when rendered vis- 
ible to man, optical illusions. We know that " all flesh 
is not the same flesh ; but there is one kind of flesh of 



ANGELIC KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 149 

men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and 
another of birds : there are also celestial bodies, and 
bodies terrestrial ; but the glory of the celestial is one, 
and the glory of the terrestrial is another." 1 Cor. xv. 
39, 40. That the celestial body is nourished, we have 
many indications in scripture. Our blessed Lord, speak- 
ing of the future state, says to his disciples, " I appoint 
unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto 
me ; that ye may eat and drink at my table in my king- 
dom ; and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of 
Israel." Luke xxii. 29, 30. When we consider into 
what surpassing fragrance and beauty the coarsest ele- 
ments of earth and water are transformed by their mys- 
terious circulation through the delicate frame-work of a 
plant, we may readily divest our minds of all that pertains 
to the grosser act of eating and drinking, and the com- 
mon properties of such nutriment as man is accustomed 
to take, and believe that in heaven as on earth, the bright- 
est, most perfect of the Lord's works is hourly depend- 
ent on his sustaining mercy, formed by his power, up- 
held by his grace, and nourished by the rich provision of 
his bountiful care. 



13* 



III. 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 

There is not, in the whole Bible, an instance where 
an angel appears to act independently of the divine com- 
mand. Perfect submission is the unvaried character of 
the heavenly host. Our Lord expresses this, in the 
prayer that he has taught us to use : "Thy will be done 
on earth, as it is in heaven." When John would have 
worshipped the angel who showed him the wonderful 
things that he has recorded for us, he was prohibited in 
these words: "See thou do it not: fori am thy fellow- 
serrant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them 
which keep the sayings of this book." Rev. xxii. 9. 

We cannot doubt that the Holy Spirit has so framed 
the word of truth as to be a perpetual antidote to every 
form of error that should creep into the world: and the 
" worshipping of angels," which constitutes a prominent 
mark of the Romish apostacy, is provided against by 
continually setting forth their entire dependence and 
subordination. They never appear but as messengers: 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 



151 



" God sent an angel into Jerusalem to destroy it." 1 
Chron. xxi. 15. " My God hath sent this angel, and hath 
shut the lion's mouths, that they have not hurt me." 
Dan. vi. 22. "The man Gabriel whom I had seen in 
the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, 
touched me about the time of the evening oblation;" 
Dan. ix. 21. "At the beginning of thy supplication 
the commandment came forth, and I am come." v. 23. 
" And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent 
from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth." 
Luke i. 26. " Now 1 know of a surety that the Lord 
hath sent his angel, and hath delivered me out of the 
hand of Herod, and from all the expectation of the 
people of the Jews," Acts xii. 11 : and in the last in- 
stance that is recorded by inspiration of an angelic mis- 
sion, we read, " I, Jesus, have sent mine angel to testify 
unto you these things in the Church." Rev. xxii. 16. 
However willingly performed to men, it is still a ser- 
vice appointed of God, and by him especially directed ; 
they are "ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to 
them that shall be heirs of salvation, " Heb. i. 14 ; and 
it is on this principle of holy obedience that we find 
them zealously executing God's rightous displeasure 
against the rebellious. 

When the way to the tree of life was to be closed 
against fallen man, cherubims were set to guard the en- 
trance, and with their flaming sword rendered it unap- 
proachable : when that way was again to be thrown 
open, and the twelve manner of fruits yielded in their 
season, and the leaves to be applied for the healing of 



152 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



the nations, twelve angels are represented as standing at 
the gates that are never to be shut, day or night, not 
armed to bar the passage, but as guards of honour, wel- 
coming the happy comers to that scene of everlasting 
felicity. The variety of commissions which we know 
the angels to have executed among men, sufficiently 
attest their prompt obedience to every command of their 
glorious King, whom to serve is their privilege and joy : 
for "he doeth according to his will in the army of 
heaven." Dan. iv. 35. " Thinkest thou," said our Lord 
to the disciple who smote the high priest's servant, 
" Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, 
and he shall presently give me more than ten legions of 
angels? But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, 
that thus it must be?" Matt. xxvi. 53, 54. 

We now proceed to review the instances of angelic 
interference, not already exhibited in these pages, as 
they occur in the Holy Scriptures ; and as the work of 
vengeance is in no way consonant to the character of a 
holy angel, except when executed in loyal obedience to 
the command of his righteous King, who will punish 
evil-doers, we may class under the present head all the 
destructive operations of the heavenly hosts. In the 
song of Deborah, we have a curse sternly denounced, in 
language highly expressive of this feeling. " Curse ye 
Meroz, said the angel of the Lord, curse ye bitterly the 
inhabitants thereof ; because they came not te the help 
of the Lord> to the help of the Lord against the mighty." 
Judges v. 23. The Lord needs no help of men or of an- 
gels ; yet the armies of heaven stand around, eager to 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 



153 



be employed against the enemies of his name, and of his 
people ; and to withhold the hand when such work is 
to be done, seems to them so hatefully unthankful, as to 
draw forth the most emphatic anathema against such 
offenders. To render a recompense to those who afflict 
Christ in his members, is indeed a part of angelic 
office, as David shows, when speaking of those who 
sought to destroy his soul, he says, " Let them be as 
chaff before the wind : and let the angel of the Lord 
chase them. Let their way be dark and slippery, and 
let the angel of the Lord persecute them." Psalm xxxv, 
5, 6. In virtue of this office, they will fulfil their terri- 
ble commission in the last days of the present dispensa- 
tion. " The Son of Man shall send forth his angels, 
and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that 
offend, and them that do iniquity ; and shall cast them 
into a furnace of fire : there shall be wailing and gnashing 
of teeth." Matt. xiii. 42. They will come fully prepared 
for the terrible work of that great day : " It is a right- 
eous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them 
that trouble you ; and to you who are troubled rest 
with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from 
heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking 
vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey 
not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." 2 Thess. i. 6, 
7, 8. He " who maketh his angels spirits ; his ministers 
a flaming fire," Psalm civ. 4, has pre-ordained them to 
act a most conspicuous part in the transactions of the 
last days, when they will execute judgment with uner- 
ring obedience, and rid the earth of those whose pre- 



154 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



sence upon it is a blemish and a curse. For a more 
particular description of the part taken by angels in the 
ministry of wrath, we must turn to the book of Revela- 
tions, where a scene of awful magnificence is opened to 
us, in language of unparalleled grandeur. 

The apostle saw, amid the mysterious splendours of 
the heaven which he was premited to view, seven 
angels standing before God, having each a trumpet in 
his hand, the sounding of which was to let loose upon 
earth a succession of woes very terrible to experience. 
In regular order, according to the command that had 
been given, each angel blew the trumpet ; and when it 
came to the turn of the sixth, he was directed to loose 
four angels that were bound in the great river Eu- 
phrates, and who, of course, were evil spirits, having 
power given them for an appointed season to destroy 
nfen by means of a people over whom they obtained 
control. Interpreters expound this of the Saracens; 
but our business is with those who seduce their minds 
and govern their movements ; and these are satanic 
spirits, loosed for the purpose by one of the angels of 
God. Rev. ix. 13 — 19. xlfter this, the apostle witnessed 
the great battle, in which Michael and his angels van- 
quished the Dragon and his host, and drove them from 
heaven. Of the combat no description is given, for 
however the mind of John might be expanded and 
strenghtened to sustain the tremendous vision, ours are 
not so fitted ; and we should sink under any attempt to 
realize it. If the sight of one mighty angel of God pre- 
paring to execute judgment on a city was so terrible to 



/ 

ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 155 

David as we have seen it was* what must have been the 
rushing to war of myriads in their most tremendous 
array ; the personal encounter of two such hosts, one 
battling for the continued possession of " high places," 
where they retained unspeakable advantages, the other 
nerved to expel those infernal rebels and intruders from 
the presence of God. 

We were told by our Lord, (Matt, xiii.) that the 
reapers are angels : one is represented to us here as 
having a sharp sickle : to whom another angel who had 
power over fire, cries with a loud voice, " Thrust in thy 
sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the 
earth, for her grapes are fully ripe. And the angel 
thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine 
of the earth, and cast it into the great wine-press of the 
wrath of God. And the wine-press was trodden without 
the city, and blood came out of the wine-press, even 
unto the horses bridles, by the space of a thousand and 
six hundred furlongs." Rev. xiv. 18 — 20. 

But greater judgments remained ; and the seven last 
plagues with which a guilty world should be visited, 
were committed to seven angels, who are represented as 
fulfilling their mission with more than passive obedience, 
if we may judge by the stern interest with which the 
result of their proceedings was watched by their heav- 
enly companions. When the third vial was poured 
out upon the rivers and fountains of waters and they 
became, blood John continues, "I heard the angel of 
the waters say, Thou art righteous, 0 Lord, which art, 
and wast, and shall be, because thou hast judged thus. 



156 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS \ 



For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, 
and thou hast given them blood to drink ; for they are 
worthy. And I heard another out of the altar say, 
Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy 
judgments." Rev. xvi. 4 — 7. But in no part of the 
inspired word do we find such a display of angelic in- 
dignation and high displeasure as in the chapters which 
follow immediately upon this. The occasion of this 
strong exhibition is the rise of that very system which 
has exalted the angels into objects of worship; and we 
must refer to the powerful principle of perfect obedience 
implanted in their spotless bosoms the extreme wrath 
with which they regard this blaspheming apostacy. 
" There came one of the seven angels which had the 
seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come 
hither, I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great 
whore that sitteth upon many waters ; with whom the 
kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the 
*1fnhabiters of the earth have been made drunk with the 
wine of her fornication." Rev. xvii. 1, 2. Having 
taken him into the wilderness to show him the typical 
representation of papal Rome, the angel proceeds to ex- 
plain to him the mystery, ending with assurance of her 
coming dissolution. "And after these things I saw 
another angel come down from heaven, having great 
power and the earth was lightened with his glory : and 
he cried mightly with a strong voice saying, Babylon 
the greati s fallen, is fallen, and is become the habita- 
tion of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a 
cage of every unclean and hateful bird." Rev. xviii. 1,2. 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 



157 



Another voice from heaven summons God's people out 
of her, and adds, " For her sins have reached unto hea- 
ven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. Reward 
her even as she rewarded ,you, and render unto her 
double, according to her works : in the cup which she 
hath filled, fill to her double. How much she hath glo- 
rified herself and lived deliciously, so much torment and 
sorrow give her." Yerse 5 — 7. These are terrible de- 
nunciations from the lips of a holy, loving angel : they 
show how abhorrent to all godliness is that great mys- 
tery of iniquity v/hich assumes to be the only true 
religion of Christ. How stern is the following apos- 
trophe uttered by the same angelic voice, in the view of 
her terrible desolation by flaming fire ! " Rejoice over 
her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets, for 
God hath avenged you on her !" Verse 20. Yet another 
exulting spirit comes forward to swell the triumph. 
" A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, 
and cast it in the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall 
that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be 
found no more at all." Verse 21. In the following 
burst of solemn rejoicing, the angels are no doubt in- 
cluded : " And after these things I heard a great voice 
of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia; salvation, 
and glory, and honour, and power unto the Lord our 
God: for true and righteous are his judgments; for he 
hath judged the great whore which did corrupt the 
earth with her fornications, and hath avenged the blood 
of his servants at her hand. And again they said, 
Alleluia." xix. 1 — 3. " And I heard as it were the 
14 



158 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many 
waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, 
Alleluia : for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth." 
Terse 6. It was in the midst of all these glorious sights 
and sounds that John fell down to worship the dazzling 
creature, who is represented as being one of the seven 
angels holding the seven last plagues, and whose reply 
so remarkably harmonizes with the Lord's declaration 
that his risen saints shall be equal to the angels. " I 
am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren that have the 
testimony of Jesus. "Worship God; for the testimony 
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." Terse 10. 

There are two classes of persons to whom the fore- 
going passages of holy writ may convey a serious and 
salutary warning. One consists of those who denounce 
the study of unfulfilled prophecy as needless if not 
dangerous ; thus indirectly charging God with placing 
a snare in our way, and of baiting it with the promise of 
a blessing to such as shall fall therein ; they do not con- 
sider that what they set aside is called by inspiration 
" The testimony of Jesus." Moses, Isaiah, David, and 
the rest of the Old Testament seers, are allowed to have 
testified of Jesus foreshowing what should be the na- 
ture, what the object and effects of his first coming into 
the world ; and why, when they and the New Testa- 
ment writers also, set forth the signs, and judgments, 
the glories connected with his second coming, should we 
be told to avert our eyes, to close our ears, and to resolve 
that until we see we will not believe 1 Speculative, no 
doubt, such studies are ; for according to our great 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 



159 



lexicographer, to speculate, means ' to meditate ; to 
contemplate ; to take a view of any thing with the 
mind and in this sense faith itself is a speculative 
thing : God has fitted our minds to behold, to embrace, 
to rest upon " things hoped for . . . things not seen 
and it is the highest privilege not only of nature but of 
grace so to do. Paul prays concerning his Ephesian 
Church, " That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the 
Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom 
and revelation in the knowledge of him : the eyes of 
your understanding being enlightened ; that ye may 
know what is the hope of your calling, and what the 
riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, and 
what the exceeding greatness of his power to usward 
who believe." Eph. i. 17 — 19. Shall we then thrust 
from us one of the greatest means of acquiring this 
knowledge, and forget that " the testimony of Jesus is 
the spirit of prophecy?' 

The other class comprises those who regard it as a 
breach of Christain charity to speak with confident glad- 
ness of the final, utter, eternal overthrow of Popery, as 
an event near at hand ; or as a thing not to be antici- 
pated at all. They do not consider, perhaps they do not 
believe, that while they are speaking smooth things of 
Popery and hoping good things concerning it, that foul 
apostacy perpetually replenishing hell with lost souls, 
provokes the wrath of God, and tiers with holy indigna- 
tion the pure angels of heaven. The charity in which 
such well-meaning Christians boast themselvs is not 
the charity of the Bible. Love to souls is what the Lord 



160 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



inculcates ; and proportioned to our love for the soul 
will be our unextinguishable hatred of that which be- 
trays and destroys it. Babylon the great, the system 
that arrogates to itself the title of the holy Catholic 
Church, that assumes to be the mother and mistress of 
all Churches, and to anathematize all without its pale — 
this great Babylon deliberately sins against light and 
knowledge ; holds the Bible and withholds it from her 
slaves ; professes Christ, and blasphemes him : raises an 
edifice seemingly on the foundation of the apostles and 
prophets, and fills it with idols, thus committing and 
drawing all her votaries all over the world to commit 
what God declares to be spiritual adultery, most hate- 
ful, most insulting to him. The angels who are repre- 
sented in the Revelation of St. John as louclly exulting 
over the voilent fall of this antichristian power, have 
been ministering spirits to those who in the dungeon, 
on the rack, and amid the flames glutted her murder- 
ous cruelty with their life-blood, and glorified the Lord 
Jesus by rejecting, with abhorrence, her sacrilegious 
rites. We cannot now enter into the depths of their feel- 
ings in the contemplation of her fearful doom: but we, 
if we belong to Christ, shall see what some of us now 
refuse to think of; and shall be constrained to glorify 
God by rejoicing over the fallen enemy of his kingdom 
and of his people; for 44 in righteouness doth he judge, 
and make war." 

Babylon being thus doomed and destroyed, it remains 
but that all the enemies of Christ should assemble for a 
final overthrow; and here we have another splendid 



ANGELIC OBEDIENCE. 



image presented to us. "I saw an angel standing in 
the sun, and he cried with a loud voice, saying, to all the 
fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, come and gather 
yourselves together unto the supper of the great God ; 
that ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of cap- 
tains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of 
horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all 
men, both free and bond, both small and great." xix. 
17, 18. 

The last act of the militant angel, distinctly recorded 
in Scripture, is one which we must all look forward to 
with joyful anticipation. " And I saw an angel come 
down from heaven, having- the key of the bottomless 
pit, and a great chain in his hand : and he laid hold on 
the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil and 
Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him 
into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal 
upon him that he should deceive the nations no more, 
till the thousand years should be fulfilled." xx. 1,2, 3. 
What part the holy angels will take in the scenes that 
are to close earth's history, we are not told. The loos- 
ing of Satan from his prison will lead to another out- 
break of human wickedness ; but fire coming down 
from God out of heaven is named as the instrument of 
the rebels' destruction ; and in the awful judgment that 
follows, no mention is made of angelic ministry in the 
execution of God's terrible decree on those who are not 
found written in the book of life. Thenceforth nothing 
but harmony, joy, and the peace of heaven, will remain 
for the angels and those who are made equal to them. 

14* 



162 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS. 



We have done with the dispensation of wrath, and now 
go back to the commencement to trace out the many 
instances in which Scripture reveals them in the sweet 
and gracious offices of love and protection to the people 
of the Most High. 



IV. 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

When treating of angelic ministry, we must bear in 
mind the sympathy which exists in their bosoms, for the 
angels know themselves to be by nature liable to fall, 
even as Adam was ; and that the same electing love 
which raises the sinner, and sets him in heavenly places 
in Christ Jesus, also preserves them from the guilt and 
condemnation of Satan and his crew. The rejoicing 
that takes place in heaven when a soul is brought to 
God in penitence and faith, is a proof of this ; and we 
shall find, as we go on, many indications of tender sym- 
pathy on the part of the angelic ministers of God's mer- 
cy to man expressed by so much condescending gentle- 
ness and delicate consideration, as we may truly call it, 
for the weaknesses of our poor fallen race, that when we 
divest an angel of his fabulous characteristics, and pic- 
ture him to ourselves the exceedingly majestic, formi- 
dable creature that holy Scripture describes, we may 
well feel our hearts melted into grateful affection for 



164 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



these our glorious and highly privileged "fellow ser- 
vants." May the Creator and Preserver alike of angels 
and of men, be with us to direct, to guard, and to bless 
our inquiries into the precious record of these angelic 
ministrations of mercy and love ! 

The first instance we meet with is that of Hagar in 
her desolation and distress, brought on herself by despis- 
ing her mistress. A fugitive, alone, and friendless, she 
had reached a fountain of water, and there rested ; pro- 
bably unable to choose a path in that desert. " And 
the angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water 
in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur. 
And he said, Hagar, Sarai's maid, whence comest thou? 
and whither wilt thou go V 9 She could not answer the 
latter part of the interrogatory, and to the former she 
gave a reply, that included no acknowledgment of her 
own misconduct ; " I flee from the face of my mistress, 
Sarai." No reproof was given : not a word of reproach 
for her rebellious offence, but what was implied in the 
answer, proving how well the celestial speaker knew 
the actual circumstances of her case. " And the angel 
of the Lord said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and 
submit thyself under her hands. And the angel of the 
Lord said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, 
that it shall not be numbered for multitude. And the 
angel of the Lord said unto her, Behold, thou art with 
child, and shalt bear a son, and call his name Ishmael ; 
because the Lord hath heard thy affliction. And he will 
be a wild man ; his hand will be against every man, and 
every man's hand against him : and he shall dwell in 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



165 



the presence of all his brethren. And she called the 
name of the Lord that spake unto her, Thou God seest 
me : for she said, Have I also here looked after him 
that seeth me? Gen. xvi. 7 — 13. There is a difficulty 
here that often meets us in similar circumstances : the 
speaker is an angel of the Lord ; yet the latter part of 
his address is delivered as in the person of God himself; 
and Hagar evidently considered that the voice was that 
of the Lord. In some cases we know that he is spoken of 
under the term angel : though in the appearance of the 
burning bush, where Moses says, "The angel of the 
Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the mid- 
dle of the bush," he presently adds, " when the Lord 
saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him 
out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. 
And he said, Here am I." Exodus iii. 2 — 4. So that 
it may be supposed he first saw a glorious angel, and 
afterwards heard the voice of God himself. This seems 
at first to be confirmed by Stephen's narrative : he says, 
" There appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount 
Sinai an angel of the Lord, in a flame of fire, in a bush. 
When Moses saw it, he wondered at the sight ; and as 
he drew near to behold it, the voice of the Lord came 
unto him, saying, I am the God of thy fathers ; the God 
of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God 
of Jacob." Acts vii. 30— 32. Yet presently afterwards 
he adds, " This is he that was in the church in the wil- 
derness, with the angel which spoke to him in the Mount 
Sinai, and with our fathers, who received the lively ora- 
cles to give unto us," verse 38. And once more, he 



166 OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 

says, " Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and 

ears who have received the law by the disposition of 

angels, and have not kept it," verses 51 — 53, and the 
plural is again used by Paul : "If the word spoken by 
angels was steadfast, and every transgression and diso- 
bedience received a just recompense of reward ; how 
shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which 
at first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was con- 
firmed unto us by them that heard him 1 ..For unto 

the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to 
come, whereof we speak." Heb. ii. 2 — 5. 

By collating these passages we may learn caution in 
pronouncing that, when the Bible tells us an angel ap- 
peared or spoke, it was God who appeared or spoke ; 
and we may also remember that the prophets very fre- 
quently make abrupt transitions from speaking in their 
own persons to speaking in the Lord's, without the 
usual preface, Thus saith the Lord : and we can readily 
suppose a created angel, fulfilling the office of an am- 
bassador from the Most High, may do the same thing, 
delivering his Master's message in his Master's words ; 
and so occasioning us to draw conclusions not warranted 
by the text. The instances in which we are undoubted- 
ly to believe that by the term angel our Lord Jesus is 
meant, are Gen. xlviii. 15, 16, where Jacob says, "God, 
before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, 
the God which fed me all my life long to this day, the 
Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads ;" 
and in that remarkable passage, Exod. xxiii. 20. " Be- 
hold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



16? 



way, and to bring thee into the place which I have pre- 
pared, Beware of him and obey his voice, provoke him 
not : for he will not pardon your transgressions, for my 
name is in him. But if thou shall indeed obey his voice, 
and do all that I speak ; then I will be an enemy unto 
thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries." 
This could hardly be spoken of any created being ; and 
we know that the provocations of the Israelites in the 
wilderness are called by St. Paul, " tempting Christ." 
1 Cor. x. 9. These cautions recorded, we may be satis- 
fied to proceed, with the plain word of inspiration to 
guide us. 

The three men who visited Abraham as he sat in the 
tent door in the heat of the day, (Gen. xviii. 1,) are no 
where called angels ; but there can be little doubt that 
two of them were the same who immediately afterwards 
went to Lot, in Sodom. This we know, that it is dis- 
tinctly said of Abraham, in reference to this event, "The 
Lord appeared unto him and that in the subsequent 
part of the narrative the Lord is represented as com- 
muning with him, and is repeatedly named. We will 
not intrude into what the Holy Spirit has so closely 
veiled, but proceed to the next chapter, where we are 
not left to guess at the nature of the persons spoken of. 
" There came two angels to Sodom at even," (Gen. xix. 
1,) evidently in human form, for Lot, as Abraham had 
done, proffered hospitable entertainment, and pressed it 
upon them with earnest importunity : the whole story 
shows that Lot had then no suspicion of their being 
other than mere mortal men, and that so far from need- 



168 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



ing his generous, self-devoted protection, they had pow- 
er and authority to destroy the place, which was only re- 
spited until he and his should be delivered. Consider- 
ing how wholly Satan and his infernal crew triumphed 
in those guilty cities, and how perfectly conscious of 
their presence and influence the holy angels must have 
been, their patient abiding in such a place, the purely 
defensive nature of the miracle which they wrought, and 
the deliberate manner in which they proceeded to extri- 
cate the favoured individuals committed to their charge, 
are very striking. Unmoved by the tumults in the street, 
continuing all night, they quietly awaited the break of 
day, for Lot was not to quit the place unseen, or under 
the cover of darkness, nor to leave his ungodly sons-in- 
law unwarned ; and so long as he staid, his presence 
was a protection to the cities, and to every sinner in 
them. The mission of the angels was two-fold, first to 
deliver the godly, then to destroy the ungodly ; and this 
renders it so lively a type of the great day of the coming 
of the Son of man, when the angels will be sent to gather 
His elect from the four quarters of the earth, previous to 
the terrible destruction that shall fall upon his foes. 
The angels expressly said to Lot, "We will destroy 
this place .... the Lord hath sent us to destroy it," 
verse 13 ; and again, " I cannot do any thing till thou be 
come thither." Verse 22. Yet they expressed anxiety, 
as though delay endangered him ; " Escape for thy life ; 
look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain : 
escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed." Verse 
17. It is lovely to contemplate the earnestly devoted 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



169 



spirit in which these blessed creatures fulfilled their 
office, even forcing deliverance upon those who were 
loth to quit a spot containing their worldly substance, 
their kindred, and neighbours ; alienated from God as the 
latter were by their wicked works. The fate of Lot's 
wife is remarkable, and as being peculiarly instructive, 
our Lord has commanded us to remember it when the 
time comes of which this deliverance was symbolical. 
She clung, it is true, to the hand of an angel, but she 
disobeyed God ; and her celestial guardian could not 
avert the penal consequences of her offence. This may 
prove a lesson to three classes of people : Angel- wor- 
shippers, worldly-minded professors, and unbelievers in 
what the Lord has revealed of his coming judgments. 
He makes his angel the means of our escape from dan- 
ger, but leaves it not in their power to preserve a hair of 
our heads from his righteous visitations : he saves us 
from among the ungodly, in answer to the prayer of 
faith, but is not pledged to continue to us the good things 
of the world on which our hearts are set : and if, through 
unbelief, we stagger either at his promises or his threats, 
we break our covenant with him, and leave our souls to 
be gathered with the ungodly. 

The next instance of angelic interposition, is the me- 
morable one of Abraham's intended sacrifice of his son ; 
and here we have the ambassador speaking indeed in the 
first person, but with the explanatory clause, " Saith the 
Lord." " And the angel of the Lord called unto him 
out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham. And he 
said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not thine hand 
15 



170 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him ; for 
now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not 
withheld thy son, thine only son from me. , . .And the 
angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven 
the second time, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith 
the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and 
hast not withheld thy son, thine only son ; that in bless- 
ing I will bless, and in multiplying I will multiply thy 
seed as the stars in heaven, and as the sand which is 
upon the sea-shore ; and thy seed shall possess the 
gate of his enemies." Gen. xxii. 11 — 17. 

When Abraham instructed his faithful steward Elie- 
zer to seek a wife for Isaac from among his kindred, he 
confidently assured him that the Lord would send an 
angel before him to prosper his way ; and this the ser- 
vant repeated to Rebekah's family, when relating the 
extraordinary manner in which he had been guided. 
Gen. xxiv. 7, 40. It is a beautiful instance of prayer- 
ful faith on man's part, and an answering providence on 
that of God. Eliezer was directed, and his way pros- 
pered in a most marvellous manner. And why marvel- 
lous ? because of our unbelief, which rarely can attain 
to such child-like reliance on the promises of God, or 
we should continually experience the same proofs, that 
what he hath promised he will also perform. 

Jacob's vision has already been noticed : he saw a 
ladder set upon the earth, the top of which reached to 
heaven ; and the angels of God ascended and descended 
upon the ladder. The interpretation of this is seen in 
the declaration of the Lord, who stood above the ladder, 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



171 



and who repeated the glorious promise — "In thy seed 
shall all the families of the earth be blessed." Gen. 
xxviii. 14. The incarnation and sacrifice of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
world, is the procuring cause of what we are now con- 
sidering — the ministry of those angels who could never 
have worn towards man any other aspect than that of stern, 
irreconcilable hostility, had man remained under the do- 
minion of Satan, to do forever the work of his conquer- 
ing master. It was through the dying and rising again 
of the Son of God, to be accomplished in the fulness of 
time, that angels could find a medium of friendly com- 
munication with earth ; and Jacob knew this, assuredly ; 
for his was the saving faith described by Paul, " the sub- 
stance of things hoped for ; the evidence of things not 
seen." Heb. xi. 1. 

The cloudy pillar had an angelic attendant. M The 
angel of God which went before the camp of Israel, re- 
moved and went behind them ; and the pillar of the 
cloud went from before their face, and stood behind 
them, and it came between the camp of Israel and the 
camp of the Egyptians." Exod. xiv. 19, 20. We can 
hardly read this without remembering what Gabriel 
said to Daniel, of Michael the Archangel, calling him 
" the great prince that standeth for the children of thy 
people." No doubt there were myriads of those celes- 
tial warriors seen afterwards on the mountain of Do- 
than ; but they had a leader, appointed of God : and of 
him it is said afterwards — " I will send an angel before 
thee ; and I will drive out the Canaanite, the Amorite, 



172 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



and the Hittite, and the Perrizite, the Hivite, and the 
Jebusite." Exod. xxxiii. 2. And to prove that this was 
to be really a created angel, the Lord also says — "For 
I will not go up in the midst of thee, for thou art a stiff- 
necked people ; lest I consume thee in the way." Exod. 
xxxiii. 3. 

We meet no more with angels, until Balaam's alarm- 
ing encounter, which does not come under this head ; 
and then we lose sight of them again, until the people 
being securely settled in the promised land, and pro- 
ceeding, as usual, to provoke the Lord by their disobe- 
dience, they are strongly reproved, yet with much mild 
dignity, by a commissioned minister. " An angel of the 
Lord came up from Gilgal to Bochim, and said, I made 
you to go up out of Egypt, and have brought you unto 
the land which I sware unto your fathers : and I said, 
I will never break my covenant with you. And ye shall 
make no league with the inhabitants of this land ; ye 
shall throw down their altars : but ye have not obeyed 
my voice : why have ye done this 1 Wherefore I also 
said, I will not drive them out from before you : but 
they shall be as thorns in your sides ; and their gods 
shall be a snare unto you. And it came to pass, when 
the angel of the Lord spake these words unto all the 
children of Israel, that the people lifted up their voice 
and wept." Judges ii. 1 — 4. Although the purport of 
this message was menacing, the tone was very gentle, 
and the remonstrance, " Why have ye done this ?*' 
following close on the remembrance of God's faithful- 
ness to his great promises, was well calculated to melt 



I 0 - 

w 

ANGELIC MINISTRY. 173 

the people as it did ; so that for a time they returned to 
their duty, and served the Lord : but revolts ensued, and 
deliverances were granted on their temporary repent- 
ance, until on another provocation, the Lord deliver- 
ed them into the hand of Midian for seven years. 
The children of Israel, greatly oppressed and impover- 
ished, cried unto the Lord ; and then followed this in- 
terposition : — " There came an angel of the Lord, and 
sat under an oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained 
unto Joash the Abi-ezrite : and his son Gideon threshed 
wheat by the wine-press, to hide it from the Midianites. 
And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said 
unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of 
valour. And Gideon said unto him, Oh my Lord, if 
the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? 
and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us 
of saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt ? 
But now the Lord hath forsaken us, 'and delivered us 
into the hands of the Midianites." It does not appear 
that Gideon suspected the celestial character of the 
person he conversed with : indeed, it is certain he did 
not ; and the respectful style in which he addressed the 
stranger must have resulted from perceiving in him so 
much of dignity, as demanded it ; while an equal de- 
gree of benevolence in his aspect, doubtless led to so 
frank a tone, in answering one who might be a spy of 
the enemy. The narrative proceeds : — " And the Lord 
looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and 
thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites : 
have not I sent thee? And he said unto him, Oh my 
15* 



174 OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 

Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? Behold my family 
is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's 
house. And the Lord said unto him, Surely I will be 
with thee, and thou shalt smite tlje Midianites as one 
man." This seems to have excited Gideon's hope 
that his companion's was indeed a message from the 
Lord : probably he took him for a prophet. " And he 
said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, 
then shew me a sign that thou talkest with me. De- 
part not hence I pray thee, until I come unto thee, and 
bring forth my present, and set it before thee. And he 
said, I will tarry until thou come again. And Gideon 
went in, and made ready a kid, and unleavened cakes 
of an ephah of flour : the flesh he put in a basket, and 
he put the broth in a pot, and brought it out unto him 
under the oak, and presented it. And the angel of the 
Lord said unto him, Take the flesh, and the unleavened 
cakes, and lay them upon this rock, and pour out the 
broth. And he did so. Then the angel of the Lord 
put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and 
touched the flesh, and the unleavened cakes ; and there 
rose up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh 
and the unleavened cakes. Then the angel of the Lord 
departed out of his sight. And when Gideon perceived 
that he was an angel of the Lord, Gideon said, Alas, 
O Lord God : for because I have seen an angel of the 
Lord face to face. And the Lord said unto him, Peace 
be unto thee, fear not : thou -shalt not die." Judges vi. 
11—23. 

After this remarkable interview with an angel mes- 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



175 



senger, we find Gideon receiving communications direct 
from the Lord himself ; but the way in which he was 
prepared for these revelations is exceedingly beautiful. 
The angel probably appeared as a wayfaring man, since 
we read of the staff that he had in his hand ; and the 
language in which he addressed the young thresher of 
wheat, was exquisitely adapted at once to encourage and 
to prepare him for fuller manifestations of the divine 
favour. After this, we hear of no more angelic visits : 
the language is uniformly, " The Lord said unto Gid- 
eon," and under the immediate direction of Jehovah, he 
wrought all his stupendous exploits, delivering Israel, 
and preserving peace within their borders to the end of 
a long life. 

There is something remarkable in the frequently ab- 
rupt transitions from the description and language of an 
angel to the presence and the voice of God himself. 
We have seen this in the first communication made to 
Moses, from the flaming bush ; and surely it is at least 
equally consonant with reason and scripture to suppose 
the Lord graciously prepared his weak, sinful creatures 
to hear His voice, and to be sensible of His special pre- 
sence, by this method of heralding Himself, as to insist 
that when an angel is distinctly named, the Lord Jesus 
is the person intended. It is dangerous to put arbitra- 
ry interpretations on God's words, for which we have 
no direct authority from Himself ; the determination ful- 
ly to comprehend and account for " secret things," 
which " belong unto the Lord our God," may lead to 
presumption, to " foolish and unlearned questions," and 



176 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



perhaps to very dangerous errors connected with the 
person and office of the Lord Jesus : while by receiv- 
ing in its most obvious sense what the Holy Spirit has 
moved his servants to write for our learning, we cannot 
greatly mistake. An inspired apostle has told us, that 
the created angels, are " ministering spirits, sent forth to 
minister to them that shall be heirs of salvation." We 
find throughout the Old Testament, and in the book of 
Revelation, angels constantly described, as engaged in 
this very work ; and why should we question their ident- 
ity ? why persist in understanding the greater part of 
these descriptions of angelic ministry as referring to Him 
of whom it is especially testified that " He took not 
upon Him the nature of angels." Heb. ii. 16. 

Gideon being gathered to his fathers, and Israel, as 
usual, continuing to revolt, and to provoke the Lord, 
they were repeatedly chastised by the hands both of 
foreign and domestic tyrants. At length, after more 
than one generation had passed away, the gracious and 
merciful God whose Holy Spirit they grieved with their 
iniquities, prepared to raise up another deliverer, and 
sent a heavenly messenger with the tidings. The his- 
tory is remarkable, and deserves particular attention. 
Manoah, a Danite, had a wife who was barren ; " And 
the angel of the Lord appeared unto the woman, and 
said, Behold now, thou art barren, and bearest not: but 
thou shalt conceive, and bear a son. Now, therefore, 
beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong 
drink, and eat net any unclean thing : for lo, thou shalt 
conceive, and bear a son ; and no razor shall come on 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



177 



his head : for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God 
from the womb ; and he shall begin to deliver Israel 
out of the hand of the Philistines. Then the woman 
came and told her husband saying, A man of God came 
unto me, and his countenance was like the countenance 
of an angel of God, very terrible : but I asked him not 
whence he was, neither told he me his name." Judges 
xiii. 3—6. 

Here we see that the angels, on such occasions, 
appeared in a perfectly human form, so as to be 
taken for mortal men : but there was that in their coun- 
tenances — probably the emanation of minds perfectly 
holy, obedient, and faithful, and habitually engaged in 
the contemplation of the Deity, which, to the corrupt 
nature of fallen man, appeared " verry terrible." To 
such " beauty of holiness " had the countenance of Mo- 
ses attained, while wholly separated from earth, and 
the grosser elements of man's ordinary sustenance, he 
had "seen God " for forty successive days on the mount. 
So, likewise, shone the face of Stephen, on the very 
verge of that martyrdom which was peculiarly honour- 
ed in being the first under the Christian dispensation. 
The woman does not appear to have taken the angel 
for more than what she called him, " A man of God," 
a prophet ; and the expression that she used in describ- 
ing the majesty and brightness of his aspect was not an 
unfrequent one, in days when angelic faces were not so 
strange upon earth as now they are. We, probably, 
associate no idea of terribleness with that trite expres- 
son, " an angelic countenance :" we know not, alas ! 



178 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



what man has lost, even in outward show, by revolting 
from his God. 

Manoah's wife went on to repeat exactly what the 
angel had said : " then Manoah intreated the Lord, and 
said, O my Lord, let the man of God which thou didst 
send come again unto us, and teach us what we shall 
do unto the child that shall be born." A beautiful in- 
stance of simple faith ! he makes no question of the 
matter, refers it all to God, and speaks of the child, 
which as yet existed but in the divine promise, as 
though it was even then about to be born. We may 
safely assert that Manoah was a man of prayer, who 
thus calmly, thankfully, received the answer to his ac- 
customed supplications. The lovely and instructive 
history proceeds : "And God hearkened to the voice of 
Manoah ; and the angel of God came again unto the 
woman as she sat in the field : but Manoah her hus- 
band was not with her. And the woman made haste, 
and ran, and showed her husband, and said unto him, 
Behold, the man hath appeared unto me, that came unto 
me the other day. And Manoah arose, and went after 
his wife, and came to the man, and said unto him, Art 
thou the man that spakest unto the woman 1 And he 
said, I am. And Manoah said, Now, let thy word3 
come to pass ! How shall we order the child, and how 
shall we do unto him 1 And the angel of the Lord said 
unto Manoah, Of all that I have said unto the woman, 
let her beware. She may not eat of any thing that 
cometh of the vine, neither let her drink wine or strong 
drink, nor eat any unclean thing : all that I command 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



179 



her, let her observe. And Manoah said unto the angel 
of the Lord, I pray thee, let us detain thee, until we shall 
have made ready a kid for thee. And the angel of the 
Lord said unto Manoah, Though thou detain me, I will 
not eat of thy bread : and if thou wilt offer a burnt 
offering, thou must offer it unto the Lord. For Manoah 
knew not that he was an angel of the Lord. And 
Manoah said unto the angel of the Lord, What is thy 
name, that when thy sayings come to pass we may 
do thee honour?' It is impossible to pass over this 
grateful, and doubtless prtriotic sentiment, for Manoah 
would have proclaimed that there was a prophet in 
Israel, and have sent his oppressed, afflicted, guilty 
countrymen to inquire of the Lord at his mouth. There 
is a nobleness in the language of this Israelitish pair 
the more striking from the simplicity and humility that 
accompany it. His request was not granted. " The 
angel of the Lord said unto him, Why asketh thou thus 
after my name, seeing it is secret?' The margin reads, 
Wonderful : and because " Wonderful " is one of the 
names by which our blessed Lord is called, some have 
assured themselves that it was Christ himself who 
spake. We see no ground whatever for the assump- 
tion: the angel Gabriel announced to Zacharias the 
promised birth of a son in his old age ; one far greater 
than Samson ; and he too was sent to Mary with tidings 
infinitely more important than either : it is surely, there- 
fore, too much to catch at a single, doubtful word 
to introduce the Lord of angels on such an occasion 
as this. Considering how prone the Israelites at that 



* 



180 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 



time were to idolatry, the very reason of Manoah'3 
question was sufficient to prevent his obtaining an an- 
swer. The holy angel would not give his name to be en- 
rolled among the new gods of Israel. " So Manoah took 
a kid with a meat-offering, and offered it upon the rock 
unto the Lord : and the angel did wonderously ; and 
Manoah and his wife looked on. For it came to pass, 
when the flame went up towards heaven from off the 
altar, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame 
of the altar. And Manoah and his wife looked on it, 
and fell on their faces to the ground. But the angel of 
the Lord did no more appear to Manoah and to his wife. 
Then Manoah knew that he was an angel of the Lord. 
And Manoah said unto his wife, we shall surely die, 
because we have seen God." The greatness of the 
miracle, and his surprise at discovering the celestial 
character of the Being with whom he had so familiarly 
conversed, were such that he went beyond the mark, as 
he had before fallen short of it, and imagined that he 
had, instead of a mere prophet, seen Him whom none 
can look upon and live. His wife's encouraging reply 
is admirable : " If the Lord were pleased to kill us, he 
would not have received a burnt-offering and a meat- 
offering at our hands, neither would he have shewn us 
all these things, nor would as at this time have us told 
such things as these." Verse 23. They would not have 
received instructions as to the bringing up of a child yet 
unborn, if their own lives were about to terminate ; 
nor could it be in wrath that the Lord had made known 
to them purposes so gracious towards themselves, and 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 



181 



towards the whole nation who were to have a deliverer 
in their offspring, whose birth and destiny were pro- 
bably thus intimated in order to impress men's minds 
more deeply with the assurance that the promised de- 
liverance was wholly of the Lord. 



16 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY, 

Under this head may properly be classed those pecu- 
liar ministrations that had reference to the prophets of 
Israel, from Elijah onward ; and, following the order in 
which they stand in the Bible, in preference ' to the 
chronological dates, we will briefly note them all. It 
will be remembered that the angel who showed the 
Apostle John the glorious things by him recorded, de- 
clared, " 1 am thy fellow-servant and of thy brethren 
the prophets ; and of them which keep the sayings of 
this book:" (Rev. xxii. 9:) from which we may at 
least gather, that the interest taken by that heavenly 
guide in these wondrous revelations, was intense. 
When, therefore, an angel is deputed to communicate 
with an inspired prophet, we feel that there is somewhat 
more than a general ministration in it : the divine know- 
ledge which the celestial being is commissioned to im- 
part to his earth-born brother fills his own mind, and he 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



183 



appreciates the high distinction conferred on himself, as 
the vessel chosen to contain and to convey a treasure 
of which all the excellency is of God. The glory of 
its Master is concerned in what he communicates ; its 
prospective fulfilment interests him deeply, as tending 
to show forth the Lord's faithfulness ; and arrayed as 
he perpetually is against the dark, subtle enemies of 
man, he rejoices in every accession of strength, wisdom, 
knowledge, gained by his poor feeble ally. To one who 
is accustomed to dwell upon those beautiful portions of 
Scripture, the tenderness that bespeaks perfect sympa- 
thy is constantly apparent on the angel's part ; together 
with an alacrity, that shows how much heart the divine 
creature puts into his work. 

First among those we have now to notice, stands the 
touching picture of Elijah, weary, exhausted, and well- 
nigh despairing, in the wilderness. He had been very 
jealous for the Lord God of Hosts, even to the braving 
of Ahab's power and Jezebel's hate. He had openly 
defied, most signally disgraced, and with determined 
justice had slain the four hundred and fifty prophets of 
Baal in the sight of all Israel ; whom he believed to be, 
with the single exception of himself, forsakers of God's 
covenant, destroyers of His worship, and murderers of 
His prophets. Throughout this transcendent work of 
faith and zeal he had not flinched ; but now pursued 
by the sanguinary menaces of Jezebel, and believing 
that every man sought his life, the solitary outcast 
stretched himself under a juniper-tree, and, asking for 
death, became overpowered by sleep. With what 



184 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



pitying tenderness must the angel's heart have yearned 
over the unconscious slumber, while employed in the 
humble office of baking a cake on the coals, and filling 
a cruise with water to place beside him ! What a spec- 
tacle of want, and sorrow, and destitution, did the prophet 
present, immediately after that glorious display of tri- 
umphant faith and power on the sides of Mount Carmel ! 
When all was prepared, " the angel touched hirn, and 
said, Arise and eat." 1 Kings xix. 5. Having done so, 
the prophet again laid down, and slept : " And the angel 
of the Lord came again the second time, and touched him, 
and said, Arise and eat ; because the journey is too great 
for thee." He not only sets before him the nourishment 
provided, but graciously and tenderly urges on him the 
necessity of strengthening himself for the unusual exer- 
tion. Often have the afflicted children of God found 
comfort in this sweet record of His watchful care, and 
of the willing service that the holy angels render, when 
no human hand can help. When, under the pressure 
of bodily privation or mental anxiety they are hearkening 
to the suggestions of Satan, and murmuring to, if not 
against the Lord, some ministering angel is on the 
wing, bearing the succour they need, the comfort they 
pine for ; and putting to shame the language of their 
unbelieving minds. 

Elijah, we are told, " went in the strength of that 
meat forty days and forty nights, unto Horeb, the Mount 
of God." 1 Kings xix. 8. Whether that day's repast 
was made sufficient for the whole period, or whether his 
strength was daily renewed by a daily miraculous supply 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



185 



of bread and water, like that of his fathers in the wilder- 
ness, is not made plain : in either case, the Lord fed 
him by the hand of a ministering spirit, and he whom 
God fed, could know no want : he whom God 
strengthened, no weariness. He fulfilled his mission, 
not without further communion with angelic helpers ; 
for though, in general, the expression is, " the word 
of the Lord came to Elijah," without specifying the 
medium through which it reached him, we are told when 
Ahaziah sent to inquire ofBaalzebub, the god of Ekron, 
concerning the event of his disease, " the angel of the 
Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, Arise, go up to meet 
the messengers of the king of Samaria," and told him 
the prophetic words that he should speak to them. 2 
Kings i. 3, 4. 

Elijah's translation into heaven was by " a chariot of 
fire, and horses of fire," no doubt forming a part of the 
magnificent array of which we are next to speak as be- 
longing to the armament of heaven : for when the ser- 
vant of Elisha, terrified at the sight of the besieging host 
of Syria compassing the city, cried out, " Alas, my mas- 
ter ! how shall we do V 9 the prophet's answer was, " Fear 
not ; for they that be with us are more than they that be 
with them." In answer to his prayer, the young man's 
eyes were opened ; " and he saw ; and behold the 
mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round 
about Elisha." 2 Kings vi. 15 — 17. Angels are not 
mentioned here ; but however the blaze of the glory 
might enwrap, and so render them invisible, we may be 
sure it was not of chariots and horses that Elisha spoke 
16* 



186 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



when alluding to the number of his unseen allies. We 
may rather suppose the scene to have resembled what 
is very glowingly described by a first-rate poet of our 
day, in referring to this passage : 

At the word rush'd a cloud 

From the crown of the sky : 
In its splendours the sun 

Seera'd to sicken and die. 
From its depths pour'd a host 

Upon mountain and plain. 
There was seen the starr'd helm, 

And the sky-tinctured vane; 
And the armour of fire, 

And the seraph's broad wing ; 
But no eye-ball dared gaze 
On the pomp of the blaze, 
As their banner unfolded 

The name of their King. 

After Elisha, Isaiah had proof of the being, the bright- 
ness, and the benevolence of God's angels. He has 
related a very remarkable vision : " In the year that 
king Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, 
high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above 
it stood the seraphims : each had six wings ! with twain 
he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, 
and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, 
and said, " Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts : the 
whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the 
door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house 
was filled with smoke. Then said I, woe is me ! for I 
am undone ; because I am a man of unclean lips : and 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



187 



I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips : for 
mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then 
flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in 
his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off 
the altar; and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, 
this hath touched thy lips ; and thine iniquity is taken 
away, and thy sin purged." Isaiah vi. 1 — 7. 

This sublime vision was the preparation for that won- 
derful strain of prophecy which has caused some, not 
inaptly, to term Isaiah the fifth evangelist. It was 
Christ's glory that he saw, and it was of him that he 
spake — John xii. 41 ; and this bright company of the 
seraphim were veiling their faces with awe before Him 
who was despised and rejected of men. In the midst 
of their solemn alternate song of adoration, the voice of 
a conscience-stricken man was heard, bewailing his 
sinfulness, and lamenting over his undone estate, the 
uncleanness of his lips, and the guilt of his people. 
Immediately a seraph is commissioned to remove his 
grief; and he, with the earnest alacrity that we have 
remarked, flies to the distressed seer, bearing not only 
a message, but a token of reconciling, sanctifying grace, 
repeating the impressive assurance, " thine iniquity is 
taken away, arid thy sin purged." It appears to have 
been in the material temple in Jerusalem, that this reve- 
lation was made ; but it is very remarkable how much 
the temple imagery prevails in representations of heaven 
itself ; even in the descriptions given him by John, who 
wrote in an especial manner for Gentile churches. In 
this vision of Isaiah, He was present who gives sub- 



188 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS ! 



stance to the shadow, efficacy to the means ; and a coal 
from off the altar was used, typical at once of the puri- 
fying influences of the Holy Ghost, and of the flaming 
zeal that should burst forth in strains of glowing elo- 
quence from the prophet's now-consecrated lip. This 
is the only place in the Bible where our translators have 
introduced the word seraphim. 

We next come to the mysterious revelations made 
to Ezekiel, who uses the appellation " cherubim," in 
describing the heavenly beings whom he saw. It seems, 
so far as our dim faculties may penetrate the mysterious 
veil, as though these were a peculiar order of angelic 
creatures. The title is constantly given to those ap- 
pearances which the Lord instructed Moses to place at 
each end of the ark of the testament, over the mercy- 
seat of which they extended their wings ; and who are 
nowhere called by the general term of angels. Their 
station, we may venture to think, is one of more imme- 
diate proximity to the throne of glory than that of others ; 
both from the position assigned to them in the material 
temple, which we are told was a figure of the true, or 
heavenly house of God, and from the descriptions given 
by Ezekiel. Cherubims also were placed at the gate 
of the garden of Eden, to wield the terrible sword of 
flame which barred all approach ; keeping the way to 
the tree of life. It is a most inviting field for the ima- 
gination to rove in, these glimpses of the heavenly ter- 
ritory, and its angelic inhabitants ; but imagination must 
not enter where we are humbly following the footsteps 
of inspiration, to speak according to the word of the 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



189 



Lord, neither more nor less ; and we must be content 
to believe, without expecting fully to understand, what 
the prophet was enabled to convey, of his own impres- 
sion of those things which he beheld ; so far, at least, 
as he makes distinct mention of beings whom we are 
taught to consider as a part of the armies of heaven. 
Whether or not these appearances were real, whether 
the angels are immaterial, invisible essences, and there- 
fore impossible to be seen by us in their natural state, 
and only clothed in the semblance of something tangi- 
ble for occasional revelation to man, or whether the 
weakness of our powers, defiled and debilitated by ori- 
ginal guilt, shuts them out from our mortal ken, is a 
point that never will be fully cleared up until we come 
to know even as we are known ; but there is quite as 
much to be said for the latter as for the former proposi- 
tion, although the weight of names is certainly against 
us ; men having inherited the opinions of their prede- 
cessors as a matter of course, and battled for all as be- 
longing to them by rightful descent. By such means 
have successive generations been blinded to the mean- 
ing of many a rich promise and glorious prediction now 
on the eve of fulfilment ; and the consequence of such 
mistaken impressions is but too likely to be that com- 
plained of by the prophet : " Lord, when thine arm is 
stretched out, they will not see !" Most ingenious ex- 
planations have been affixed by various commentators 
to the minute particulars recorded by Ezekiel of the 
visions that he beheld ; but with these we have nothing 
to do ; our business being with the literal descriptions. 



190 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS 



Ezekiel, being among the captive Jews carried into 
Babylon, was commissioned to bear to them many re- 
bukes and remonstrances, mingled with most glorious 
promises, from the Lord. In his first chapter, he gives 
a full account of the appearance that he beheld ; which 
is thus introduced : — '* A whirlwind came out of the 
north, a great cloud, and a fire unfolding itself, and a 
brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as 
the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire. Also 

out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living 

/ • 

creatures. And this was their appearance ; they had 

the likeness of a man." He proceeds to describe the 
four faces, four wings, and other peculiarities of these 
living creatures, who, he says, " ran and returned as the 
appearance of a flash of lightning;" and of the im- 
mense wheels that were beside them ; the crystal firma- 
ment that was directly over their heads, and the appear- 
ance of a sapphire throne placed above all, "and upon 
the likeness of the throne was the likeness as the ap- 
pearance of a man above upon it." From the Lord, 
whose glory he thus beheld, he received a message to 
his people, the children of the captivity: and having 
thus given an outline of that which he beheld, the bright- 
ness of the objects being so dazzling that he could but 
speak of " the likeness of the appearance " as it then 
impressed his mind, he records in his eighth chapter a 
farther revelation made to him in the presence of the 
same mysterious glory, when he was taken to behold 
the various idolatrous abominations practised in Jerusa- 
lem to provoke the Lord, and shown also the terrible 



I 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



191 



judgments about to fall upon the offenders. An angel, 
described as " a man clothed with linen, having a writer's 
inkhorn by his side," is sent through the city, to set a 
mark upon the foreheads of the men who sighed and 
cried for the abominations that were done ; and six 
others, each with a slaughtering weapon in his hand, 
then proceeded to slay all who were not so marked, be- 
ginning at the sanctuary. This being done, and reported 
by the man in the linen garment to Him who sat on the 
throne, " he spake unto the man clothed with linen, and 
said, Go in between the wheels, even under the cherub, 
and fill thine hand with coals of fire from between the 
cherubims, and scatter them over the city. And he 
went in my sight. Now the cherubims stood on the 
right side of the house, when the man went in ; and the 
cloud filled the inner court. Then the glory of the 
Lord went up from the cherub, and stood over the 
threshold of the house ; and the house was filled with the 
cloud, and the court was full of the brightness of the 
Lord's glory. And the sound of the cherubims' wings 
was heard even in the outer court, as the voice of the 
almighty God when he speaketh. And it came to pass 
that when he had commanded the man clothed with lin- 
en, saying, Take fire from between the wheels, from 
between the cherubims, then he went in and stood beside 
the wheels. And one cherub stretched forth his hand 
from between the cherubims unto the fire that was 
between the cherubims, and took thereof, and put 
it into the hands of him that was clothed with linen ; 
who took it, and went out." x. 2 — 7. The conclusion 



192 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



of the vision is thus related : " Then the glory of the 
Lord departed from off the threshold of the house, and 
stood over the cherubims : and the cherubims lifted up 
their wings, and mounted up from the earth in my sight i 
when they went out, the wheels also were beside them : 
and every one stood at the door of the east gate of the 
Lord's house : and the glory of Israel was over them 
above :" verses 18, 19. 

The word cherubims signifies flaming ones ; and we 
find either flame or its concomitant, a cloud of smoke 
generally present, when the Lord was pleased to mani- 
fest himself, under the Old Testament, either in the 
temple or to his people apart from it ; we are also told 
that the second coming of our Lord in great glory, ac- 
companied with the holy angels, shall be " in flaming 
fire." We have just enough information respecting 
this order of the celestial servants of our God to believe 
that they have some special office of peculiar attendance 
on their King. David says, " He rode upon a cherub, 
and did fly," Psalm xviii. 10 ; and again, "The chariots 
of God are Wenty thousand, even thousands of angels : 
the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place." 
Psalm Ixviii. 17. We may compare such expressions 
with the chariots and horses of fire seen by Elisha's 
servant, and that which took up Elijah into heaven ; and 
without intruding improperly into things not seen, we 
may be allowed to believe that glimpses have been given 
into realities hereafter to be fully known and understood, 
while the assurance that such glorious intelligencies do 
exist, and in great multitudes surround us, fulfilling each 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



193 



the will and rendering prompt service to their Master 
and ours, is most soothing to the child of earth who, 
exiled from the bright company of sinless beings, pur- 
sues his way in loneliness of spirit, often feeling as 
though throughout the wide creation there was no being 
to sympathize with him now, though he may look for- 
ward to such communion hereafter as disembodied spi- 
rits can together enjoy. 

Ezekiel had another vision, in which an angel showed 
him marvellous things : things that to this day are un- 
fulfilled, and concerning which the church remains in 
greater perplexity than in almost any other prophetic 
matter. Having been brought in the visions of God to 
a very high mountain in the land of Israel, he says, — 
" there was a man whose appearance was like the ap- 
pearance of brass, with a line of flax in his hand, and a 
measuring reed." Ezek. xl. 3. This divine messenger 
measures out and describes to the prophet with most 
minute exactness, a city and a temple of which we as 
yet know nothing ; but it is a marvellous instance of 
prediction and direction, continued through no fewer 
than eight chapters, by the means of this angelic in- 
structor who almost appears identical with the angel 
described by St. John, as employed in like manner for 
his instruction. 

We now arrive at that lovely portion of scripture, the 
Book of Daniel, and may trace more at large what has 
already been repeatedly noticed. Daniel was greatly 
favoured by direct revelations from the Lord : the king's 
dream and its interpretation were made known to him, 
17 



194 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 



to the conversion, as we may hope, of the once proud 
and blood-thirsty tyrant, Nebuchadnezzar. In like 
manner, he was enabled to show forth to the miserable 
Belshazzar his coming doom, with the downfall of great 
Babylon, the vivid prototype of that idolatrous harlot 
city, Rome, which in our day rules and riots, and ripens 
for sudden destruction. Under Darius, the prophet 
again enjoyed such favour, influence, and command, as 
moved to envy, the selfish princes of the kingdom. 
They sought occasion, but found none, to carry an un- 
favourable report against him, to his royal patron : and 
at length they were driven to the expedient of inventing 
an offence, that Daniel was sure to commit, by making 
it penal to pray to the God of heaven. The device suc- 
ceeded : Daniel prayed, repeatedly and without disguise ; 
and a few hours saw him cast into a den, where hun- 
gry lions were impatiently awaiting their accustomed 
meal. We are not introduced to that scene of peril, of 
darkness, and horror — the noisome abode of ferocious 
beasts of prey ; strewed with the splintered bones of the 
many human victims, that Babylonish cruelty delighted, 
even as its antitype delights, to prepare for barbarous 
slaughter. We only know, that after remaining there 
during the night, the faithful servant of the Lord was 
able to answer the king's sorrowful inquiry, by saying, 
" My God hath sent his angel, and hath shut the lion's 
mouths, that they have not hurt me." Dan. vi. 22. 
He had other company than the ravenous beasts, who 
were thus chained back into the innocuous character that 
they bore in the garden of Eden, and to which they 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



195 



shall again be restored, when the Conqueror of sin and 
of death comes to reign over a renovated earth. The 
darkness of the dungeon was no doubt chased away by 
the same " bright light " that shone around Peter in his 
prison ; and angelic converse cheered the hours, while 
the noble beasts were crouching around, unconscious 
whence arose the calm, under the influence of which 
their ferocious feelings were so lulled that a lamb might 
have lain down among them in safety. The angel had 
doubtless power to intimidate, and forcibly to restrain 
the ravenous beasts ; or the terribleness of his aspect 
might have awed them into trembling submission : but 
it is more consistent with the loving, compassionate dis- 
position of an angel, when dealing with those who are 
not at enmity with God, to use gentleness, and to bring 
peace. 

But it was in the course of his prophetic visions, that 
Daniel has related the fulness of angelic communica- 
tion repeatedly made to him. These visions, in point 
of time, preceded his deliverance from the lions ; the 
first being in the first year of Belshazzar. Here, the 
rise of the little horn, the papacy, was revealed ; and its 
final destruction is thus awfully described. " I beheld 
till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days 
did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair 
of his head like the pure wool : his throne was like the 
fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery 
stream issued, and came forth from before him : thou- 
sand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand 
times ten thousand stood before him : the judgment was 



196 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



set, and the books were opened. I beheld then because 
of the voice of the great words which the horn spake ; 
I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body de- 
stroyed, and given to the burning flame." Dan. vii. 
9 — 11. Troubled and grieved at the mysteriousness of 
these fearful things, the prophet " came near unto one 
of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all this," 
(verse 16,) and he received an interpretation, distinct 
and full, setting forth the grand outline of this world's 
history, until the glorious termination, when " The king- 
dom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom 
under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of 
the saints of the Most High ; whose kingdom is an 
everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and 
obey him." Yerse 27. Whether the interpreter in this 
instance was the same who afterwards became his teach- 
er, Daniel does not say ; but when at the end of two 
years another vision appeared, he says, " It came to 
pass when I, even I Daniel, had seen the vision, and 
sought for the meaning, then, behold, there stood before 
me as the appearance of a man. And I heard a man's 
voice, between the banks of Ulai, which called and said, 
Gabriel, make this man to understand the vision. So 
he came near where I stood ; and when he came, I was 
afraid, and fell upon my face : but he said unto me, Un- 
derstand, 0 son of man ; for at the end of the^time shall 
be the vision." viii. 15 — 17. This is the first time we 
have mention made of Gabriel, the honoured messenger 
of so much mercy to man ; but indeed the latter part of 
the book of Daniel brings us more in contact with the 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



197 



angels than any that precede it ; enabling us to form, 
as it were, an acquaintance with those whom we humbly 
hope to associate with through eternity. 

Some years after this, when Darius had been made 
king over Chaldea, Daniel, computing the time revealed 
to Jeremiah, found that the restoration of his people to 
Jerusalem could not be far distant, and accordingly set 
himself to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, 
the promised mercy. He made a touching confession 
of sins, personal and national; pleaded the cause of 
God's afflicted exiles, and implored the removal of his 
chastening — the renewal of his former love to Israel. 
The prayer is one that we cannot too generally adopt, 
in reference to the present state of the Jews, and the 
sure word of prophecy which testifies that their second 
restoration is now drawing nigh. Having continued 
in this beautiful prayer for some time, the prophet says, 
" And while I was speaking, and praying, and confess- 
ing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and present- 
ing my supplications before the Lord my God for the 
holy mountain of my God ; yea, while I was speaking 
in prayer, even the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in 
the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, 
touched me about the time of the evening oblation. 
And he informed me, and talked with me, and said, O 
Daniel, I am now come forth to give thee skill and un- 
derstanding." Dan. ix. 20 — 22. The sequel has already 
been quoted : and the revelation made to Daniel is so 
conclusive as to the time, the object, and the conse- 
quences of our Lord's first coming, that the Rabbinical 
17* 



198 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



teachers to this day withhold that part of God's word 
from their people, assured that it must at once enlighten 
them on a subject where, being themselves in darkness, 
they earnestly desire to keep their brethren shrouded 
from the light of dayi. Three years afterwards, when 
Daniel again was fasting and mourning before the Lord, 
another revelation was vouchsafed to him, more full, 
comprehensive, and remarkable, than any we can point 
out ; for it embraces a period commencing with Daniel's 
time, and stretching out to the end of all things. The 
vision which he saw is very mysterious ; one of the 
descriptions so closely resembling that which John gives 
of his glorified Lord, that we must pause to apply it to 
a created angel. " Then I lifted up mine eyes, and 
looked, and behold a certain man clothed in linen, whose 
loins were girded with fine gold of Uphaz : his body 
also was like the beryl, and his face as the appearance 
of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and his arms 
and his feet like in colour to polished brass, and the 
voice of his words like the voice of a multitude." Dan. 
x. 5, 6. This vision was unseen by Daniel's compan- 
ions ; " but a great quaking fell upon them, so that 
they fled to hide themselves." He was left alone, and 
fell into a trance ; and in this state, " Behold a hand 
touched me, which set me upon my knees and the 
palms of my hands. And he said unto me, 0 Daniel, 
a man greatly beloved, understand the words which I 
speak unto thee, and stand upright : for unto thee am 
I now sent. And when he had spoken this word unto 
me, I stood trembling." Dan. x. 10, 11. It appears 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



199 



that there may have been a change of persons here : we 
are not told that the speaker was the same with him 
whose glorious appearance so overpowered a man ac- 
customed to awful sights of heavenly splendour, and 
whose presence, though unseen, was so felt by his com- 
panions, as to send them trembling to a hiding-place. 
This last circumstance has no parallel in any record of 
the kind ; for in all other cases the individuals were 
terrified only by what they saw and heard. We would, 
however, be reverently cautious in deciding a matter 
infinitely too high for any child of man. When this 
last speaker had spoken farther, and told him of the 
opposition made by the prince of the kingdom of Persia, 
and the help given to him by Michael, and added that 
he was about to tell what should befall the Jewish peo- 
ple in the latter days, Daniel says, " And when he had 
spoken such words unto me, I set my face toward the 
ground, and I became dumb. And behold, one like 
the similitude of the sons of men touched my lips ; then 
I opened my mouth, and spake, and said unto him that 
stood before me, O my Lord, by the vision my sorrows 
are turned upon me, and I have retained no strength : 
for how can the servant of this my Lord talk with this 
my Lord ? for as for me, straightway there remained no 
strength in me, neither is there breath left in me. Then 
there came again and touched me one like the appear- 
ance of a man, and he strengthened me, and said, 0 
man greatly beloved, fear not : peace be unto thee ; be 
strong, yea be strong." Dan. x. 15 — 19. It is proba- 
ble that this angel was Gabriel, who had used language 



200 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



exactly similar on a former occasion, as being sent to 
instruct him, the man " greatly beloved.'' He proceeds 
to relate the wonderful things that it pleased the Lord 
to reveal for the comfort and encouragement no less than 
for the instruction of his church ; and as we are told, 
" In the mouth of two or three witnesses, shall every- 
thing be established." Such confirmation was added 
to the angel's assurance, " Then I Daniel looked, and 
behold, there stood other two, the one on this side the 
bank of the river, and the other on that side of the bank 
of the river. And one said to the man clothed in linen 
which was upon the waters of the river, How long shall 
it be to the end of these wonders ? And I heard the man 
clothed in linen, which was upon the waters of the river, 
when he held up his right hand and his left hand unto 
heaven, and sware by him that liveth for ever, that it 
shall be for a time, times, and a half ; and when he shall 
have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy peo- 
ple, all these things shall be finished. And I heard, 
but I understood not: then said I, 0 my Lord, what 
shall be the end of these things? And he said, Go thy 
way, Daniel : for the words are closed up and sealed till 
the time of the end." Dan. xii. 5 — 9. 

When we read of things being shown in a vision, we 
are apt to regard it all as the imagery of a dream ; and 
those who find it difficult to realize to themselves the 
actual existence of spiritual beings always apply the 
word vision as opposed to what it actually imports : they 
interpret it to mean not something seen, but something 
not seen : a mental phantasmagoria, unreal, and easily 



ANGELIC SYMPATHY. 



201 



produced by a disordered state of the bodily functions, 
affecting the brain. This, of course, no believer can 
for a moment venture upon connecting with any thing 
declared in Scripture; but many seem to think that 
what the inspired writers are described to have seen of 
angelic beings, was only a sort of allegorical represen- 
tation : a vehicle for conveying to their minds certain 
impressions concerning the divine will and purpose. So 
far from agreeing in these phantomizing interpretations, 
we believe Daniel to have truly seen with his bodily eyes 
the angels of God, even as the keepers at the sepulchre 
and the disciples saw them at the Lord's resurrection ; 
and as we shall all see them when he comes in the glory 
of his Father, with the holy angels. God can speak 
to his servants without any such intermediate agency, 
as we find in a multitude of instances throughout the 
Scriptures ; but in some cases he has seen fit to employ 
one or more of the heavenly host, and has also com- 
manded his witnesses to record it for our instruction. 
We surely owe it to our Divine Teacher to receive with 
thankful humility and undoubting credence, what he has 
vouchsafed thus to reveal to us of the interest taken by 
his angels in the concerns of men ; and to believe that 
a book, not one thing contained in which may we dare 
to take away or to alter, the whole being given by the 
inspiration of God, and profitable for doctrine, for re- 
proof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 
that such book is not a volume of riddles and allegories ; 
but is a plain, comprehensible declaration, no less of 
what we are to believe than of what we are to do. 



VI. 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 



It may appear strange to devote a separate section to 
this subject, seeing that the whole is, so far, essentially 
Jewish : but we live in a time so peculiar, and the por- 
tion of the Old Testament which remains to be con- 
sidered, bears so directly upon what we in our day look 
for, while it primarily treated of a former and very partial 
work of mercy, that we must especially point it out. 
Zechariah was co-temporary with Daniel during the 
later years of that great prophet's ministry ; and in the 
abundance of the prophetic revelations made to him he 
was scarcely less favoured : but his visions have this 
distinguishing mark, that they refer almost exclusively 
to the literal restoration of the literal Israel to the land 
which God gave unto their fathers, and to their seed 
after them for an inheritance to the end of the world. 

Daniel sometimes beheld several individuals of the 
angelic legions uniting their testimony as to the divine 
authority of what was declared to him ; but Zechariah 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 203 

saw them in larger numbers, and astir with great vivacity 
in the work of preparation for the return of his people 
from captivity. It is a glorious spectacle that this sub- 
lime book opens to us, and may well shame our cold- 
heartedness in a cause so dear to the inhabitants of 
heaven. For our example, no doubt, equally as for the 
encouragement of Israel after the flesh, is all this writ- 
ten down ; and howsoever we may delude ourselves by 
the so-called spiritualizing of these things, if not to the 
exclusion at least to the national extinguishment of the 
Jews as a separate people, we shall yet find that a literal 
accomplishment will be given to every word which the 
Lord has spoken of, or to, the natural descendants of 
Jacob — yea, that one jot or one tittle shall in no wise 
pass away, until all be fulfilled. 

We cannot fully enter upon the extraordinary instan- 
ces of angelic kindness, and we may call it affectionate 
freedom of discourse displayed in the book of Zechariah. 
He begins by relating, " I saw by night, and behold a 
man riding upon a red horse, and he stood among the 
myrtle trees that were in the bottom ; and behind him 
there were red horses, speckled and white. Then said 
1, 0 my lord, what are these ? And the angel that talked 
with me said unto me, I will shew thee what these be. 
And the man that stood among the myrtle trees answered 
and said, These are they whom the Lord hath sent to walk 
to and fro through the earth. And they answered the 
angel of the Lord that stood among the myrtle trees, and 
said, We have walked to and fro through the earth, and 
behold, all the earth sitteth still, and is at rest." Zech. i. 



204 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS ! 



8 — 31. It has been decided by expositors in general 
that the man who stood among the myrtle trees was the 
Lord Jesus; and this decision seems to be grounded 
on the sequel ; " Then the angel of the Lord answered 
and said, 0 Lord of Hosts, how long wilt thou not have 
mercy on Jerusalem, and on the cities of Judah, against 
which thou hast had indignation these threescore and 
ten years 1 And the Lord answered the angel that talked 
with me, with good words and comfortable words." 
(Verse 12, 13.) Christ being the one appointed Medi- 
ator between God and man, it is alike vain and sinful to 
seek the intercession of any created being; but are we 
therefore justified in denying to the angels a privilege 
that we know from holy writ the spirits of the redeemed 
enjoy ? John heard the souls of them that were slain 
for the testimony of Jesus, asking how long it would be 
ere their blood was avenged on them that dwelt upon 
the earth ; and surely an angel might venture to remind 
the Lord that the time spoken of by Jeremiah, threescore 
and ten years, was now come to an end ; and to ask 
how long it should yet be ere he would have mercy on 
Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, which were to be 
rebuilt and inhabited again. In the first year of Darius, 
Daniel made his accepted prayer, grounded on his under- 
standing by the books that the number of the years re- 
vealed to Jeremiah was almost fulfilled : and in the 
second year of Darius, Zechariah hears an angel remark- 
ing the same thing, in a tone of reverential entreaty. 

Surely those holy, zealous servants of the Lord are 
not less concerned than we are for the glory of his name, 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. *205 

and confusion of his enemies in the exact performance 
of all his gracious promises, The Lord having answered 
the angel that talked to Zechariah " with good words 
and comfortable words," the purport of that answer was 
joyfully proclaimed by the angel ; who then dictated to 
Zechariah what he was to declare in the Lord's name, 
of his merciful purposes to Zion, and his sore displea- 
sure " with the heathen that are at ease." The angel 
next showed the prophet a symbol of the power of the 
Gentiles, scattering Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem ; and 
of the destruction that awaited them for so doing. It is 
very beautiful to mark the bustle and joyous activity 
among the heavenly hosts, when the Lord's purpose of 
immediate mercy to his people and his land was made 
known. " I lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and be- 
hold a man with a measuring line in his hand. Then 
said I, whither goest thou 1 And he said unto me, To 
measure Jerusalem, to see what is the breadth thereof, 
and what is the length thereof. And behold, the angel 
that talked with me went forth, and another angel went 
out to meet him, and said unto him, Run, speak to this 
young man, saying, Jerusalem, shall be inhabited as 
towns without walls, for the multitude of men and cat- 
tle therein : for I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a 
wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the 
midst of her." ii. 1 — 5. A splendid strain ensues, ex- 
pressive of the coming revival, and more distant tri- 
umph of Israel in Jerusalem ; after which, says the 
prophet, " He showed me Joshua the high priest, stand- 
ing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at 
18 



206 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS 



his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said unto 
Satan, The Lord rebuke thee, 0 Satan : even the 
Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee : is not 
this a brand plucked out of the fire ? Now Joshua wa3 
clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the an- 
gel." Zech. iii. 1—3. Whoever is meant by this an- 
gel before whom Joshua stood, one thing is certain ; we 
have here the great adversary himself in person resisting 
the re-establishment of Israel as a nation, and the Lord 
silencing his malignant opposition, and repeating the 
blessed assurance, that the brand whieh he desired to 
consume, was, indeed, by the Almighty arm, plucked 
from the burniag. Joshua was then re-clad, and a mitre 
placed on his head, " And the angel of the Lord stood 
by : and the angel of the Lord protested unto Joshua, 
saying, Thus saith the Lord of Hosts ; if thou wilt walk 
in my ways," &c. The prophet appears to have been 
lost in the contemplation of the things then promised to 
his beloved people, but he was recalled to witness fur- 
ther wonders : " The angel that talked with me came 
again and waked me, as a man that is wakened out of 
his sleep, and said unto me, What seest thou?" iv. 1. 
He sees some typical objects ; and with the respectful 
freedom that the condescension of his guide was well 
calculated to encourage, he asked, " What are these, my 
Lord ? Then the angel that talked with me answered 
and said unto me, Knowest thou not what these be 1 and 
I said, No, my Lord," verses 4, 5. The same form of 
interrogation, and an explanatory reply from the angel, 
occurs again five times 5 exhibiting most beautifully 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 207 

the indulgent temper of the holy angel, who continually 
invites inquiry, and evident!* takes a high pleasure in 
making every thing known to the prophet. The very 
expression used by our angel to another, " Run, speak 
to this young man," when the word to be spoken was 
an assurance of the coming restoration, abundance, and 
security of Jerusalem, indicates a feeling perfectly simi- 
lar to that with which we would all hasten to communi- 
cate to a beloved friend any tidings of especial glad- 
ness and advantage. It gives rise to reflections, that 
ought at once to awaken our gratitude, and doubly to 
increase our zeal ; for surely we cannot make light of 
such indications of sympathy on the part of creatures 
who have far less cause than we to rejoice in the Lord's 
returning love to his ancient, chosen people. The an- 
gels who, at different periods of his wonderful history, 
communed with Abraham, and made known to him, on 
some occasions, the will of the Lord, which at other 
times he knew by direct inspiration — those very angels, 
with all the perfection of memory belonging to their 
high natures and faculties, never impaired by sin, are 
watching the fulfilment of every tittle of what was then 
foreshown. He, who by the threshing-floor of Oman 
the Jebusite pointed his drawn sword over Jerusalem, 
and gladly sheathed it at the command of her forgiving 
Lord, still looks upon her desolations, and yearns over 
the royal city of David, trodden under foot of the Gen- 
tiles ; while a sword, more destructive than that which 
he wielded iu the three days' pestilence, is upon her 
children from generation to generation, consuming not 



208 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



merely the life of the body, but extinguishing also that 
of the soul. Gabriel, who so minutely set forth to Da- 
niel the dates of things which were to come, is watch- 
ing for the time when Michael, the great prince that 
standeth for the Jewish people, shall " stand up," and 
bring the afflictions to an issue. He who reminded the 
Lord that his indignation against Jerusalem and the 
cities of Judah, had already burnt on to the predicted 
threescore and ten years, is waiting now to see the days 
fulfilled, when a far longer and fiercer visitation of the 
divine displeasure shall have an end, and one angelic 
messenger may hasten another to run with the glad 
tidings of pardon ; of jealousy for Jerusalem, of sore 
displeasure against the heathen who are at ease, and of 
the final fraying of every horn of pride that has contri- 
buted to scatter Judah and Israel. We naturally take 
a livelier interest in events of which we have ourselves 
seen the commencement, and fully expect to see the ter- 
mination, than in those which began before our days, 
and are not likely to come to an end till we are gone. 
Thus it is that we may in some measure comprehend 
the feeling of earnest expectation with which the holy 
angels must regard the winding-up of this world's his- 
tory, the creation whereof, in its bright unclouded 
morning, called forth their songs and shouts of joy. 
Every word of God to man was spoken in the presence 
of spirits both good and bad ;" and while the devils, who 
themselves are constrained to believe, and tremble, would 
fain retard the accomplishment of the Lord's merciful 
purposes, by stirring up the vile principle of unbelief, 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 209 

rebellion, and ingratitude in man's heart, the angels, 
though they can have no sympathy with unholy, un- 
thankful, disobedient men, yet mourn over the delin- 
quency that originated in the successful wiles of a pow- 
erful and subtle foe, and long for the time when their 
King shall take to himself his great power, and reign 
triumphant over the earth, according to the sure pro- 
mises which they have often been commissioned to re- 
peat and reiterate in his name. Regarding with holy 
indignation the work of malignant sin, as wrought by 
their apostate fellows in a creature once so fair and so 
good, they rejoice in the presence of God over even one 
repenting sinner, and celebrate each individual triumph 
of divine grace, as an earnest of what is ultimately to be 
accomplished throughout the whole earth. The glory 
of the Lord is intimately concerned in the exact fulfil- 
ment of every word that he has spoken ; and no marvel 
if" the angels desire to look into" the gradual develop- 
ment of that mighty plan which is known tP none but 
God alone, except as far as he has foreshown it in pro- 
phetic revelations, and gradually brings it to pass in the 
sight of angels, of devils, and of men. 

All this we know from the sure word of God; and 
can we doubt of their intense interest in that particular 
family which for a long period of time constituted their 
only care? We say their only care as regards this 
earth ; for throughout the Gentile world the system of 
devil-worship prevailed, all being sunk in idolatry ; and 
it is morally impossible that with such the angels of God 
could have any fellowship, or behold without horror 
18* 



210 



OP THE HOLY ANGELS : 



those detestable perversions of human intellect, those 
bold strivings against the inward law of man's con- 
science, that refused to acknowledge the glorious Crea- 
tor in his visible works ; and, turning his truth into a 
lie, gave that honour to stocks and stones, to beasts, 
reptiles, and their own vilest passions, embodied and 
deified, which was due alone to him who gave them rain 
and sunshine, and fruitful seasons, filling their hearts 
with food and gladness. The only work that we can 
suppose the angels to have been engaged in among the 
heathen nations is that which we believe they are con- 
tinually performing throughout the whole world — the 
bearing away from earth those rescued souls whose clay 
tenements are dissolved in infancy ; and who, not having 
sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression ; 
that is to say, knowingly and wilfully, are yet laid under 
the sentence of bodily death ; while the all-atoning blood 
of the Lamb is applied to them, cancelling the original 
debt, and they are eternally saved. This we firmly 
believe to be the case with every human being who 
dies in infancy ; not that their quitting the body before 
they have wilfully sinned gives them any title to heaven ; 
but that God, who will surround his throne with a great 
multitude whom no man can number, out of every kind- 
red, and people, and nation, and tongue, sets the seal of 
his electing love on a certain number, and takes them 
away : such early departure not being the cause but the 
effect of their salvation. Over these, we may well be- 
lieve the angels have an especial charge, tenderly watch- 
ing them during their transitory sojourn in the flesh, 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 211 



perhaps communing with their spirits, which though yet 
unable to act by the bodily functions, may be free to 
hold high and glorious intercourse with the unseen world 
— to us unseen — and then rejoicingly taking charge of 
their liberated souls, as our Lord informs us they did 
of that of Lazarus, who " died, and was carried by the 
angels into Abraham's bosom." Luke xvi. 

But with this exception, we repeat, one family of the 
human race monopolized the favouring care of the heav- 
enly hosts during many successive generations. The 
angels cannot move a step, save as commissioned by 
their king ; and he says to the people of Israel, " You 
only have I known of all the families of the earth." Amos 
iii. 2. They alone were the recognised objects of his 
love ; to them only were committed the revelation of his 
will : they were chosen, called, preserved, led, and by 
a succession of miraculous mercies, forgiven their trans- 
gressions, because of them, as concerning the flesh, 
Christ was to come ; and because to them the gift and 
calling of God which are without repentance, insured a 
pre-eminence of national privilege forever. 

And what a pre-eminence of privilege do they now, 
through the long period of the Gentile dispensation and 
their own dreadful depression, enjoy? Gigantic empires 
have arisen, and towered on high, and crumbled into 
dust: Babylon, the queen and the hammer of the whole 
earth is broken, and becomes heaps of burnt rubbish, 
and pools of stagnant mud. Of Nineveh no trace re- 
mains, by which to identify its very site : Greece, Per- 
sia, survive in name, but what now are the men whose 



212 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



fathers ruled the world ? Rome indeed continues, and 
rules, but how ? the battle-axe and weapons of war 
have been superseded by the monk's cowl and the har- 
lot's cup ; and she is reserved to light up with the blaze 
of her burning the scene of Israel's predicted jubilee. 
In the midst of all these changes, the Jew abides the 
same ; in every particular the same as when God led 
him up out of Egypt, with one creed, one language, one 
liturgy, one sorrow, and one hope, he is found in every 
corner of the globe, a severed fragment of that exqui- 
site design which the Lord shall again arrange as of 
old, to be the beauty and the glory of earth. Other 
people have changed their gods, which be no gods, and 
assimilated themselves to the abominations of neigh- 
bouring or invading unbelievers ; and even Christianity, 
apart from the Papal apostacy which wholly unchristian- 
izes itself, has separated into so many varying sects 
and denominations, that, to a superficial or ignorant ob- 
server, it appears to consist of a multitude of religions, 
each contradicting the rest ; but in the midst of this 
stands Judaism, a blighted, but still a stately tree, un- 
altered in form and undiminished in size by the visita- 
tion that has bound up its sap, and shrivelled the once 
verdant leaf into dryness and corruption. Upon this 
noble ruin is fixed the eyes of the angelic squadron, the 
Maranaim who once met Jacob on his mysterious way, 
who surrounded the march of his descendants when 
traversing the depths of the sea, and the paths of the 
wilderness that so long shut them in ; who heralded the 
presence of the Most High, when in clouds and dark- 
ness, with mighty thunderings and bursting flames of 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 213 

fire he descended on Sinai to commune with a man of 
that unspeakably favoured and privileged race, and to 
establish a covenant with the whole people of Israel. 
Those angels well knew that the covenant is as immuta- 
ble as the ordinances of day and night ; and that though 
their offences be visited with the rod and their iniquities 
with scourges, yet the Lord will not utterly withdraw his 
loving-kindness, nor suffer his truth to fail. Blighted 
and dishonoured as the leafless tree may appear in the 
sight of man, they know that the Lord hath said it shall 
again strike root downward, and bear fruit upward ; 
and that the glory of the coming deliverance and final 
honour shall so exceed whatever the people of Israel 
have aforetime enjoyed as to cause even the stupendous 
miracles of their wonderful beginning to be compara- 
tively forgotten. " Behold the days come, saith the 
Lord, that they shall no more say, The Lord liveth, 
which brought up the children of Israel out of the land 
of Egypt ; But, The Lord liveth, which brought up and 
which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the 
north country, and from all countries whither I had 
driven them, and they shall dwell in their own land." 
Jer. xxiii. 7, 8. These declarations are disbelieved, or 
explained away by men, and the hope of poor Israel is 
esteemed a vain thing, while yet walking in darkness 
and having no spiritual light, he stays himself upon 
this word of the God of his fathers ; but the angels, 
well knowing that word is not yea and nay, look for- 
ward with earnest expectation to the triumphant proof 
of his faithfulness with whom is no variableness neither 
shadow of turning. 



214 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS 



We have no reason to suppose that the angels knew 
beforehand how our Lord would be rejected of his own 
when he came into the midst of them. Many among 
the Jews, like Hannah and Simeon, were waiting for 
the consolation of Israel : and when the aged believer 
held the child Jesus in his arms, and proclaimed him a 
light to lighten the Gentiles, and to be the glory of his 
people Israel, it is probable that, like the disciples after 
our Lord's resurrection, and even after he had opened 
their understanding to understand the Scriptures, he ex- 
pected the kingdom to be at that time restored to their 
nation. Such would be the impression on the minds of 
the angels, so far as we can judge ; and the joy with 
which the messages were borne successively of the ap- 
proach of his forerunner, of his own conception, and of 
his birth, was undoubtedly a joy in which the chosen 
people of God, the Jews, were a very principal object. 
When Gabriel appeared to Zacharias in the temple, 
and announced the honour about to be put on the house 
of the aged priest, he said of the promised child, " And 
many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord 
their God." Luke i. 16. It was in the Jewish temple, 
in the midst of the Aaronic rites, and standing beside 
the altar of incense, that this bright angel was revealed 
to the officiating priest ; and surely the heart of Gabriel 
must have glowed with holy joy, while remembering 
the promise that the glory of that latter house should 
exceed the glory of the former, immeasurably as it 
came short of it in external and internal magnificence ; 
and a measure of resentful displeasure might well 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 215 

mingle itself with his gladness, when the chilling doubt 
of Zacharias was opposed to his declaration. The 
language of his reply is exceedingly lofty : "lam Ga- 
briel, that stand in the presence of God ; and am sent 
to speak to thee, and to shew thee these glad tidings." 
Luke i. 19. He could not but remember Daniel's 
simple faith, and holy joy, when welcoming his more 
dim and distant communication of things, that should 
come to pass long after the prophet's departure. — 
Daniel's language was not " Whereby shall I know 
this 1 " — but " 0 my lord, how long shall it be to the 
end of these wonders ? " The angel proceeds to inflict 
the gentle but necessary chastisement provoked by the 
old Israelite's want of faith. " And behold, thou shalt 
be dumb, and not be able to speak, until the day that 
these things shall be performed because thou believest 
not my words, which shall be fulfilled in their season." 
Luke i. 20. Here he seems abruptly to have departed. 

Six months after, the same zealous angel was de- 
spatched on a mission for which the heart of each one 
who reads these pages, whether Jew or Gentile, ought 
to send up a song of thanksgiving to the Lord. It 
strictly belongs to this branch of our subject, since it 
was most peculiarly and exclusively a Jewish event, so 
far. He in whom all the families of the earth were to 
be blessed, was emphatically the seed of Abraham ; 
and we shall see how peculiarly this was marked in the 
language of Gabriel. He " was sent from God unto a 
city of Galilee, named Nazareth, to a virgin espoused 
to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David : 



216 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



and the virgin's name was Mary. And the angel came 
in unto her, and said. Hail, thou that art highly fa- 
voured, the Lord is with thee : blessed art thou among 
women." This glowing and beautiful salutation, so 
expressive of delight in the honour to be put upon the 
simple maiden of Israel, and in the stupendous mercy 
about to be shown to man, has been perverted into an 
atrocius piece of blasphemous idolatry by the apostate 
Church of Rome, which like Satan himself, chooses 
the holiest things to pollute, and to make occasions of 
sin. Gabriel, seeing her troubled and perplexed at such 
an address from so glorious a personage, proceeded to 
encourage her ; and telling her of the Son whom she 
was chosen to bear, he said, *' He shall be great, and 
shall be called the Son of the Highest : and the Lord 
God shall give unto him the throne of his father David : 
and he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever." 
Luke i. 32, 33. 

Now it is certainly very difficult, with any respect for 
scriptural example, or any regard to the inspired phrase- 
ology, to take that expression " the house of Jacob," 
otherwise than as literally signifying the actual descend- 
ants of that patriarch. Believers of every nation are 
the children of Abraham by faith : they are spiritually 
called Israel in some passages : and Jerusalem which 
is above is the mother of us all : but " the house of Ja- 
cob" is as definite in its meaning as is "the house and 
lineage of David ;" and we have just as much right to 
make a figure of the latter, as of the former. 

Our Lord's personal ministry also was so far exclu- 
sively among the Jews, that when the Syro-phenician 



ANGELIC INTEREST IN THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 217 

woman besought him to heal her daughter, he answered, 
I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Is- 
rael : nay, he so far established the exclusiveness of the 
Jewish son-ship, up to that time, as to add, " It is not 
meet to take the children's bread, and cast it to dogs." 
Moreover, if those were Gentiles who came from the 
East to seek the new-born King of the Jews, the reve- 
lation of his birth being made to them not by angelic 
messengers but by the appearance of a star in the visi- 
ble heavens, and that when they were to be warned not 
to return to Herod, it was by an intimation from God in 
a dream, confirms the fact, that so far the family of Is- 
rael after the flesh, was that branch of mankind on 
which the angels of God fixed their regards, and to 
whom they ministered, and concerning whom they an- 
ticipated most glorious things. When Joseph was 
minded to put away Mary, an angel satisfied him that 
she had in no way deserved the suspicion that he natu- 
rally harboured concerning her ; and this angel addressed 
him, " Joseph, thou son of David," with an obvious al- 
lusion to the promise so fondly cherished by every be- 
lieving Jew. Accordingly to this head belongs in part 
the subject of the next section, and however disposed 
the wild graft may be to boast itself against the natural 
branches, we may rest assured that there is no event in 
man's history so intensely watched and anxiously waited 
for by the holy angels as that of the literal Israel, no 
longer abiding in unbelief, being once more grafted 
into their own olive-tree, to blossom and bud, and fill 
the face of the world with fruit. 

19 



VII. 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 

One part of " the mystery of godliness" consists in 
"God manifest in the flesh" being "seen of angels." 
1 Tim. hi. 16. The Apostle Paul, who declares this, 
elsewhere speaks of himself and his brethren as being 
" made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and 
to men." 1 Cor. iv. 9. But in order to acquire some 
little understanding of that amazing scene which opened 
upon the eyes of the holy angels, when "the Word 
became flesh and dwelt among us," we must revert 
again to the magnificent vision of Isaiah, who saw the 
Lord high and lifted up, and hi3 train filling the tem- 
ple ; the winged seraphim standing before him, covering 
their faces with their wings, and crying one to another, 
as though too deeply were struck to address the mighty 
One himself, " Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of Hosts." 
We must remember the prophet's exclamation of dis- 
may and despair, for that he, a man of unclean lips, 
had seen the Lord ; and the process by which one of 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



219 



the seraphim was commissioned to remove his fear of 
present destruction. Then turning to the twelfth chap- 
ter of St. John's gospel, we find it written concerning 
Jesus of Nazareth, " These words spake Isaiah when 

HE SAW HIS GLORY, AND WROTE OF HIM." 

He, therefore, who was thus seen of angels manifest 
in flesh, being formed in fashion as a man, making him- 
self of no reputation, taking upon him the form of a ser- 
vant, and humbling himself even to the death of the 
cross, He was the King, the Lord of Hosts, to whom 
the seraphim could not lift their faces, and of whose 
glorious holiness they spoke one to another in tones of 
solemn awe. Great indeed must be the love of those 
celestial creatures to our fallen race, when they could 
even rejoice in triumphant songs, because, for our sakes, 
that terribly glorious King of Heaven had become a 
" babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying in a 
manger." Oh, that we could, in any degree, realize 
what was then seen of angels, that our cold hearts 
might glow with a portion of gratitude and love to Him! 
The greatest wonder in redemption is the frozen indiffer- 
ence with which man contemplates his Redeemer's work. 
Even the best of men in his best moments must be a 
spectacle to angels through his lukewarm composure, 
and the feebleness of his efforts to make known to his 
fellow-sinners what the angels, who themselves gained 
nothing by it, rushed in troops to communicate, and 
celebrated with songs of enraptured praise. 

They had seen the Lord's Christ, as a mortal infant, 
his birth-place a stable, and his companions the beasts 



220 



OF THE HOLY AIsGELS : 



of the stall. Under the divine direction, they then pro- 
ceeded to make known to some of the Lord's people 
the miracle of divine love. It is certainly the most ex- 
quisite picture in the whole Bible, if we can divest our 
minds of the absurdly-childish idea which our preju- 
dices have probably associated with the appearance of 
an angel, ajid portray to ourselves the majesty, no less 
than the beauty in which those splendid creatures are 
arrayed, when not walking the earth in the form and 
the garb of men. 

There were " Shepherd's abiding in the field, keeping 
watch over their flocks by night : and lo, the angel of 
the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord 
shone round about them, and they were sore afraid." 
This angelic herald, who came to proclaim his King 
and their's, seems to have worn, as it were, his robe of 
state for the occasion. He " came upon them," proba- 
bly standing between earth and heaven, as the mighty 
angel whom David saw, but not armed with a destroy- 
ing sword ; and the brightness that shone in his counte- 
nance, a glory derived like that of Moses' face, from 
contemplating the presence of God, shed a broad light 
on the group of astonished shepherds, who beheld in a 
moment the darkness of night turned into the blaze of 
day ; and were terrified at the spectacle of so august a 
being. " And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for 
behold I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall 
be to all people. For unto you (Israelites) is born this 
day in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the 
Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you, Ye shall find 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 221 

the babe wrapped in swaddling-clothes, lying in a man- 
ger." How grand is the sequel ! " And suddenly 
there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly 
host, praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the 
highest, and on earth, peace, good-will towards men !" 
It would seem as though the very wonder, not to say 
consternation, occasioned by seeing the Lord of heaven 
and earth so abased as they described him to be, were 
lost in the joyful assurance, that since he, the Prince of 
Peace, was come down to dwell on earth, peace must 
ensue in all her borders ; and that such a token of good- 
will to men was the sure earnest of defeat and destruc- 
tion to the evil spirits who had so long borne rule over 
her population. The seed of the woman had appeared ; 
the serpent's head would therefore now be effectually 
bruised ; and since we may well believe it utterly im- 
possible that angelic natures should conceive the extent 
to which man's hardened depravity could be driven by 
Satan, even to the crucifying of the Lord of glory, their 
benevolent joy knew no drawback ; and with a sudden 
burst revealing themselves, as they were permitted to 
do, to those favoured Jews, they filled the visible space 
with their glorious forms, and poured forth the divine 
harmony of their combined voices, until ascending in 
the view of the shepherds, they went away from them 
into heaven. Upon this scene the mind of infancy al- 
ways seems to fasten with a peculiar feeling of its ten- 
der beauty ; and " the child Jesus," the " babe wrapped 
in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger," often becomes 
the hope of a heart too young to comprehend the nature 
19* 



222 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



of its faith — a saving faith, we may not dare to doubt, 
in many cases where the wilful sin of childhood requires 
that such a hold should be taken of the atoning Saviour; 
and when the neglect of those whose general custom it 
is to defer the work of instructing a soul in the know- 
ledge of God, until long after Satan has set his infernal 
imps to familiarize it with evil, would have the little one 
to perish, but for such merciful provision on the part of 
the Most High for those whom he purposes to remove 
by an early death, but not before they have sinned after 
the similitude of Adam's transgression. 

The next appearance of an angelic watcher over the 
incarnate Lord, was in a dream to Joseph, warning him 
" Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and 
flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee 
word ; for Herod will seek the young child to destroy 
him." Matt. ii. 13. "Until I bring thee word," — how 
zealously affected were these heavenly creatures in the 
good work it was their privilege to labour in ! This 
angei was apprized of the bloody purpose of the tyrant, 
and knew that he should be permitted to watch the pro- 
gress of his impious conspiracy against the new-born 
King, and to convey to the believing guardian of that 
most sacred charge, tidings of safety, when all peril 
was past. He seems to have cautioned Joseph against 
any possible deception from other quarters : he was not 
to return from Egypt until the same messenger, who 
now bade him flee thither, should again appear to au- 
thorize his quitting it. We may readily assure ourselves 
that bright squadrons of the highest angels of God, sur- 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



223 



rounded those poor fugitives, and kept at bay every foe 
that might have crept on their nocturnal path. Christ 
was at all times " seen of angels," and in one way or 
another they perpetually " ministered unto him." The 
assurance of safety, through Herod's death, was at 
length given by the angel in another dream ; and once 
more in the full sense of which the former deliverance 
had been but a prophetic type, out of Egypt God called 
his Son. 

Of our Lord's early years no record is given, and 
we are not warranted in supplying the blank from any 
stores of imagination. Of this we are sure, that the 
Lord Jesus exhibited alike to angels and to men an all- 
perfect model of holiness, harmlessness, undefiled pu- 
rity, perfect obedience, and that glorious righteousness 
by the imputation of which, all who believe on him are 
justified from all things : that he magnified the law and 
made it honourable, showing forth the sublime beauty 
of that in which man sees, alas ! little to desire, and 
much to shrink from as grievous and burdensome. 
Thus he continued, to his thirtieth year, when he went 
forth to John in the wilderness, to be baptized, and to 
receive that public testimony from heaven, the voice of 
the Almighty God, proclaiming " This is my beloved 
Son, in whom I am well pleased ; " while the myste- 
rious Spirit descended and abode on him. John be- 
held this, and others, his disciples, chosen to bear testi- 
mony to this solemn anointing of our great High Priest ; 
but their eyes were not opened to behold the glory that 
surrounded them — the sapphire throne, the fiery cheru- 



224 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



bim, the innumerable company of angels, and the many 
thousands of Israel, with the multitude of those who in 
all ages had looked forward, and by faith embraced the 
promise of the Seed of the woman, and having seen the 
day of Christ afar off, now witnessed his actual en- 
trance on the area of that terrible conflict which he 
came to wage. We can have but very poor conceptions 
of that awful hour, if we consider not the great cloud of 
witnesses, angels, and disembodied souls of men, who 
thronged to gaze upon the spectacle ; and who, beyond 
doubt, likewise surveyed the personal encounter that 
followed it. 

Of this we have before spoken, and exhibited the 
successive wiles of the devil to allure his mighty an- 
tagonist into some concession on which he might lay 
hold. He left the Man Christ Jesus on a pinnacle of 
the temple, whither he had been permitted to bear him 
for the last trial of his stedfastness ; and then it was 
that " angels came and ministered unto him." Up to 
that moment they were not permitted to interfere : 
Michael and his holy angels might form in bright array, 
and the dragon's fallen angels might eagerly look on, 
panting for their master's success, but none durst inter- 
pose. The strife was personal, and the triumphant 
issue certain ; for who among created beings, ever har- 
dened himself against God, and prospered ? " Seen of 
angels " at all times, it was not often that they were 
privileged to succour their incarnate Lord as now we 
are told they did. The cake and the cruise of water 
provided by the angel for Elijah's refreshment, were 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



225 



cheerfully prepared and courteously bestowed ; but with 
what eager gladness of heart must those ministering 
spirits have brought to their gracious King the suste- 
nance that his body, exhausted by the prolonged fast, 
then required ! We may believe it to have been an 
epoch in the existence of the holy, happy creatures 
who were chosen to render this service and gently too ; 
to facilitate his return from the giddy height to which 
Satan had borne him ; and to listen to the gracious 
words that spoke acceptance of their devotion : for he 
who with such authority rebuked and commanded the 
unclean spirits whenever they crossed his path, had 
surely words of another tendency whereby to encourage 
the obedient, and to animate the zealous servant. 

But from thenceforth unmitigated suffering was to 
be the lot of the Lord Jesus, in order that ours might 
be a lot of unmingled blessedness : foxes have holes, 
and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man 
had not where to lay his head. Disbelieved on by his 
brethren, who also mocked and aspersed him ; slighted 
if not opposed by other kindred after the flesh ; not open- 
ly acknowledged or countenanced by any but the poor 
of the people ; and subsisting on the little aid that such 
could afford to give ; it does not appear that the angels 
were allowed to yield relief to his bodily necessities, or 
to cheer his human spirit by any perceptible sympathy 
in his griefs. They, however, furnished him with a 
continual theme of discourse ; so constantly adverted 
to, indeed, that were no mention made of them in any 
other part of God's word, we could gather enough from 



226 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



our Lord's incidental allusions to inform us what are 
their natures, their employments, their dispositions, and 
present and future privileges. It is remarkable how 
often he dwells upon them as interested spectators of 
the affairs of this world ; and witnesses of what shall 
hereafter come to pass. "Whosoever shall confess me 
before men, him shall the Son of Man also confess be- 
fore the angels of God : but he that denieth me before 
men, shall be denied before the angels of God." Luke 
xii. 8, 9. " Whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of 
my words, of him shall the Son of Man be ashamed, 
when he shall come in his own glory, and in his Fa- 
ther's, and of the holy angels." Luke ix. 26. " When 
the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the 
holy angels with him, than shall he sit upon the throne 
of his glory ; and before him shall be gathered all na- 
tions." Matt. xxv. 31, 32. It would be impossible to 
reconcile such expressions as these with any ignorance 
on the part of the heavenly host as to what passes 
among men; on the contrary it clearly implies that 
they, having looked upon every transaction in the human 
family throughout its continuance, will be summoned 
as witnesses to the exact justice of the final award, when 
all are gathered together in one vast assemblage, to re- 
ceive their everlasting doom. 

But we must return to the story as regards an- 
gelic interpositions, recorded in the narrative of our 
Lord's personal sojourn on earth. After the close of 
his combat with the Evil One, we read no more of their 
appearance, until that most awful scene when, with his 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



227 



soul exceeding sorrowful even unto death, the Re- 
deemer withdrew a little way from his drowsy disci- 
ples, and poured out before his Father that prayer 
which betokened the extreme depth of his humiliation, 
in sbmitting to endure the mortal anguish of human 
fear, the fear of approaching death. Far be it from 
us to follow the example of some who would fain 
pry into the impenetrable mystery of that hour's 
suffering! We are told that it was the hour of the 
powers of darkness ; when the prince of this world came 
to find that he had nothing in the Son of God ; when the 
supplication was wrung from the Redeemer's lip, that if 
it were possible the cup might pass from him ; yet qua- 
lified by the submissive addition, " Nevertheless, not my 
will, but thine be done." Then it was that " there ap- 
peared an angel unto him, from heaven, strengthening 
him," Luke xxii. 40, and what a mission that angel had! 

The mind sinks under this scene ; not the bright 
throng of chariots and horses of fire that surrounded 
Elisha, not the array of seraphim, seen by Isaiah, giv- 
ing glory to the Lord of hosts ; not the great multitude of 
the heavenly host who appeared to celebrate his incar- 
nation ; not even the party of those who came to min- 
ister unto him when Satan had departed ; but one single 
solitary angel appeared, coming direct from heaven, 
from the immediate presen.ce of God the Father, advan- 
cing through the gloom and stilness of night, and for 
what purpose? to strengthen him from whom all 
strength is derived ! We cannot tell of what nature 
was the strength conveyed : we have the word, and 



228 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 



nothing more ; and we know that, notwithstanding the 
strength thus imparted, " being in an agony he prayed 
more earnestly, and his sweat was as it were great drops 
of blood falling down to the ground." Luke xxii. 44. Of 
this spectacle the angel was a witness ; and a witness 
he will prove against such as reject the salvation 
wrought out for them at such a fearful price by the Son 
of God ! We cannot pretend to descant on this heart- 
piercing scene ; we have it, indeed* most clearly set 
forth for our trembling contemplation, and deeply ought 
we to ponder it. The Lord of hosts, the King of glory, 
prostrated on the earth that he created, offering up 
"prayers and supplications, with strong crying and 
tears," Heb. v. 7, in an agony that wrung a bloody 
sweat from every pore, while one of the brightest of his 
creatures, sent from tke invisible throne of God, stood 
by, imparting such strength as he was commissioned to 
bring, and beholding the sons of men, for whom all this 
was undergone — unmindful of the repeated admonition 
to watch and pray, and not even sufficiently alive in 
their Master's cause, at this extreme point of his dis- 
tress, to watch with him one hour — slumbering at the 
distance of a stone's cast. Surely this was the lowest 
point of the Saviour's humiliation, when he could 
accept strength from a created angel : and surely it 
ought also to lay us in the lowest depth of self-accusing 
shame, that for our grievous sins and provocations he 
was so bruised, so put to grief ; while not one of the 
three-especially selected out of the chosen twelve, no not 
even the beloved and loving John had a word of" conso- 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



229 



lation, or a gesture, a look of sympathy to tender ; nor 
a movement of the heart towards him who could have 
read its most secret throb. All were sleeping, sleeping 
indeed for sorrow, but not with a sorrow like his, who 
was suffering for them. It seems to endear the holy 
angels, that one of their number should have been 
found, seeking to soften that unutterable bitterness of 
our Master's grief; and to strengthen him, when for- 
saken of all help, assailed by Satan, and with the keen 
prophetic anticipation of all the morrow's torments full 
on his spirit. 

But though only one appeared to help him, many 
were the angelic spectators of that night's agony. We 
know that Christ was " seen of angels :" and we can- 
not believe that ever, for one moment of time, were 
their regards withdrawn from him. There is a remark- 
able passage in the Epistle to the Ephesians, iii. 9 — 11, 
where the Apostle speaks of " the fellowship of the 
mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath 
been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ; 
to the intent that now unto the principalities and 
powers in heavenly places might be known, by the 
church, the manifold wisdom of God, according to the 
eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our 
Lord." By these principalities and powers in heavenly 
places, the angels must necessarily be meant : and the 
making known to them the manifold wisdom of God 
by the church, seems no less clearly to imply that the 
contemplation of the adorable mystery of man's re- 
demption by the incarnation, sufferings, obedience, 
20 



230 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



death, and resurrection of the Lord Christ, brought a 
vast accession of the knowledge of the glory of God, 
even to the highest of created intelligences. To the re- 
bellious, " the wicked spirits in high places," was 
thereby shown forth in dazzling display, the immensity 
of the mercy and goodness against which they had 
irretrievably sinned ; and of the wisdom that could 
devise, and the power that could accomplish the resto- 
ration of man from the ruin into which Satan had 
plunged him, in a way perfectly consistent with that 
solemn declaration, " In the day thou eatest thereof, 
thou shalt surely die," and with every attribute of the 
Most Highest. To the holy angels, who have joy in the 
presence of God over every sinner that repenteth, how 
inexpressibly beautiful and glorious must be this work 
of their Divine Master. Theirs was the privilege to 
behold him throughout every stage of its arduous pro- 
gress, and we cannot enter into the deep feeling, the 
full comprehension, with which they pour forth the ever- 
lasting song, " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain !" 
It is marvellous how little some excellent people allow 
themselves to think about the angels, as connected with 
this theme : the blank left in their system by the omis- 
sion of so very rich a part of God's revelation would, 
at least to us, be a very dreary one. We could not 
afford to forget that the Lord Jesus in all that he did 
and suffered for us was watched, marvelled at, and ex- 
ceedingly glorified by those with whom we look to be 
hereafter equal, but to whom we are now so immeasura- 
bly inferior, that a single individual among them could, 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



231 



with a movement of his powerful arm, depopulate this 
land ; or by the brightness of his appearance, if fully 
revealed to our sight, turn, as Daniel expressed it, " our 
comeliness into corruption." 

It is impossible to conceive what must have been the 
emotions with which the angelic host looked on, while 
the dreadful work proceeded from the moment of our 
Lord's agony in the garden, to that of his being taken 
down from the cross. We can hardly read those words, 
" Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, 
and he shall presently give me more than ten legions of 
angels V without fancying every naming sword among 
the listening myriads starting from its sheath, and every 
countenance blazing with ardour, to receive the com- 
mand. They had witnessed the detestable act of the 
mercenary traitor ; they had seen Satan enter into him 
and lead him to the guilty chief priests, and animate 
him to grasp with avaricious delight the wretched bribe, 
a goodly price that they valued Him at, whose is the 
silver, and whose is the gold, and whose is the round 
world and all that it contains ! and now they beheld the 
wretched man conducting his midnight band to the gar- 
den, the scene of that terrible agony, and that beauteous 
submission to the Father's will : they beheld him ap- 
proach, and salute his Divine victim ; they saw the in- 
constant Peter, now fully roused from sleep, fighting for 
him with whom he would not watch ; they saw the bands, 
the cords and fetters, the preparation for such horrors, 
as surely they could not expect to have beheld their 
heavenly King subjected to ; and they heard those 



232 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



words of conscious power and majesty, in which he 
named them — them, his own loyal, loving angels, as 
ready to appear to the rescue. Oh, what a blaze would 
have burst upon that night of black darkness, had not 
Omnipotence restrained the glowing legions. " But 
how then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it 
must be ?" added the meek Saviour, and the thought of 
deliverance was past. Gabriel could not forget his own 
message to Daniel; the seventy weeks were accom- 
plished, and Messiah must be cut off. Their intimate 
acquaintance with all that God has revealed, and the 
sure confidence they have, that whatever he hath spoken 
shall come to pass, even as he has said it, are to the 
angels instead of a foreknowledge that no creature may 
attain to : and if we gave the like heed to what God has 
declared, and with the same simple faith and plain un- 
derstanding received it, we should find ourselves far 
better forewarned than now we are for the changes of 
this worldly scene, and armed with a more perfect sub- 
mission to what betides us. 

The saa* events of that evening in Gethsemane were 
followed, as we all know, by others more terrible far ; 
and equally in the Jewish sanhedrim, in Pilate's house, 
and Herod's judgment hall, in the streets of Jerusalem, 
and on Calvary, was the Lord Jesus "seen of angels." 
They heard the false witness borne, the infamous sen- 
tence given ; they saw the scourging, the crowning with 
a diadem of thorns, the reed placed in that hand, which 
in its protecting shadow had so long hidden the house of 
Israel from their foes I They heard the scoffing homage 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



233 



tendered by rude idolatrous heathen soldiers to Him, 
whose regal glories filled all heaven with splendour : 
they saw the heavy cross laid on that shoulder where 
God has laid the government of all created things ; and 
they were constrained to witness the payment of the 
world's ransom in the trickling drops that oozed from 
those pierced hands and feet. The rocks were rent* 
but those awe-struck angels could not if they would, 
have burst the bonds of obedience to the voice that bade 
them be still : the sun hid himself, but through the dark- 
ness of that unnatural night, the bleeding Lamb of God 
was still " seen of amgels." 

Where were the heavenly hosts, while for the appointed 
time, the dead body of Jesus lay in the sepulchre? It 
was a Jewish sabbath, and it seems to have become a 
blank in time, because the light of the world was resting 
in the darkness of the grave. It was passed over — the 
ordinance transferred to the next glorious morning ; and 
ever since the first day of the week has been the Sabbath 
of the Christian world. 

But now we shall find the holy angels thronging a 
spot of earth, with all their glowing characteristics de- 
veloped in a remarkable manner. The suspicious mur- 
derers entertained a fear lest their Victim might yet rise 
again ; and they obtained from the Roman governor 
permission to seal the stone that covered the entrance of 
the sepulchre, and to set a watch of soldiers over it. 
The strict discipline of the Roman army made this a 
most efficient guard ; but the debt was now fully can- 
celled. He who had died for our sins was to rise again 
20* 



2.34 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



for our justification : death had no more dominion ove r 
him. Nothing in the Bible is more splendid than the 
picture presented to the mind by the very brief recital of 
that glorious event. " And behold, there was a great 
earthquake : for the angel of the Lord descended from 
heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the 
door, and sat upon it. His countenance was like light- 
ning, and his raiment white as snow; and for fear of 
him the keepers did shake, and became as dead men." 
Matt, xxviii. 2, 3. There is something very real in 
this description — very much opposed to the incor- 
poreality of the angelic host. The act of rolling away 
the massive stone which the good Joseph of Arimathea 
had placed as a security against the enemies of that 
sacred body, and which the high priests had farther 
made sure, and moreover sealed it, as a barrier against 
his friends, and his seating himself upon it, we can 
hardly believe to have been only in semblance. The an- 
gel, the highly-privileged angel, who was sent, or rather 
who was permitted to rush upon this enrapturing ser- 
vice, seems to have alighted upon earth with a force 
that made it quiver ; and to have rent or spurned from 
its place, the stone that barred the egress of the Lord 
Jesus from his dark prison. No mortal eye beheld that 
egress ; the countenance of the angel caused the keep- 
ers to become as dead men : knowing as they did that 
any violation of the seal upon that stone would be visited 
on them with the extreme of punishment, they had no 
power to resist ; they fell prostrate, rendered senseless 
by terror ; and no marvel, seeing what was the aspect 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



235 



of the angel. Our foolish and improper habit of using 
the most hyperbolical comparisons on ordinary occa- 
sions, deprives scripture of much of its due force. As 
quick as lightning, as vivid as lightning, are expres- 
sions in ordinary use among us ; and when we read 
that the angel's countenance was like lightning, we do 
not perhaps recall one of those terrific flashes or blazes 
of electric fire, from which the boldest is constrained to 
avert his eyes ; and add it to the highest possible ex- 
pression of intellectual power. We do not even try to 
render that small measure of justice which our very 
imperfect faculties would enable us to yield to the might 
and majesty of an angelic envoy from Him who maketh 
his ministers a flaming fire. And we may well believe, 
that the triumphant joy, the holy indignation of the angel, 
who came to open the Lord's sepulchre, would shine 
forth from his countenance with a most heavenly ra- 
diance. The miserable children of the dust had so far 
been allowed to work their wicked will, and Satan, ut- 
terly crushed as his head now was through the assump- 
tion of all power, both in heaven and in earth, by his 
Almighty Conqueror, had still, with his inferior spirits, 
an hour during which they could boast that their con- 
quest over vile man had laid the Lord of life in the 
grave. Very short, and fearfully embittered, was that 
season of hellish exultation ; but it was enough to rouse 
the keenest emotions in the breast of a celestial spirit ; 
and we may be assured, that when the longed-for com- 
mand was issued, and the waiting angel sped his way to 
the garden of Joseph, the poor, wretched soldiers of 



236 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



Rome engaged but little of his attention, fixed as it must 
have been on the baffling of the malice of Satan. Not 
against the miserable sinners of earth, the poor heathen 
slaves who occupied an assigned post at the sepulchre, 
did the lightning of his countenance flash forth ; but 
against those hostile legions who had wrought so much 
wo ; against him who, having had the power of death, 
was now virtually destroyed by the dying of the Lord 
Jesus. 

Although only one angel is named as having executed 
this commission, we know that many were present. No 
mortal was found worthy to witness that greatest event 
that creation ever viewed — the rising of the Son of God 
from the tomb ; but " seen of angels " it unquestiona- 
bly was ; and they seem to have become visible under 
different circumstances, singly or not, to the individuals 
who came to the sepulchre. Thus we find that the 
angel who in the sight of the keepers sat upon the stone 
which he had just rolled away, was not found there by 
the women, but, finding the stone rolled away, " and 
entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sit- 
ting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment ; 
and they were affrighted. And he saith unto them, Be 
not affrighted : Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was 
crucified : he is risen ; he is not here : behold the place 
where they laid him. But go your way, tell his disci- 
ples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee : 
there shall ye see him, as he said unto you." Mark 
xvi. 5 — 7. Here we read of no lightning, nothing to 
terrify : the angel's aspect is that of a young man, and 



CHRIST SEEN OF ANGELS. 



237 



his words full of gentleness and peace. He speaks as 
one intimately acquainted with all that so thrillingly 
interested them : he refers to what had been spoken to 
them by their Lord ; and Peter, whose heart was still 
writhing under the conscious guilt of his denial, is par- 
ticularly named, to assure him of his being still in- 
cluded among the beloved followers of the Lord. 

Again, when Mary Magdalen was there alone in- 
dulging her grief, " as she wept, she stooped down, and 
looked into the sepulchre, and seeth two angels in white, 
sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, 
where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto 
her, Woman, why weepest thou ? She saith unto them, 
Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know 
not where they have laid him." John xx. 11 — 13. It 
seems as though the angel, knowing how often our Lord 
had spoken of his resurrection from the dead, marvelled 
how any one who loved him could weep at the evident 
fulfilment of that glorious prediction. 

During the forty days of our Lord's farther continu- 
ance on earth, we may be assured that he was still 
" seen of angels," who surrounded his path, adoring 
him, ministering unto him, and eargerly looking for- 
ward to the moment when they should escort him to 
his throne above, with the rejoicing song, " Lift up your 
heads, 0 ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting 
doors, and the King of Glory shall come in !" Those 
forty days that intervened between the rising again and 
the ascension into heaven of the Lord Jesus, were a 
precious type of the coming time, when earth shall 



238 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS. 



once more enjoy the presence of her heavenly King, 
and bask in the brightness of his divine glory, while 
angels tread her peaceful surface, and that which is now 
but a howling wilderness of sin shall blossom like a 
rose, and become as the garden of Eden. May the 
Lord hasten that day, when his children, no longer buf- 
feted by messengers of Satan, and pining for commu- 
nion with Him, too often in vain through the abounding 
of temptations, and the deep knowledge and subtlety of 
those with whom they must continually wrestle, shall 
serve him without fear, while dwelling in the presence 
of his millennial glory ! 



VII. 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 

It is a remarkable circumstance, that whereas we do 
not read of any visible interposition of angels in the af- 
fairs of men, as ministering spirits, until after the call of 
Abraham, and the promise to him of Christ as his seed, 
or, to the very last, with the single exception of Corne- 
lius the centurion, all to whom we are told they appeared 
in that capacity, were of Abraham's race. We are fully 
assured, that to every child of God they render the 
same offices of love and care as to the ancient people of 
the Lord; but, together with the Jewish dispensation, 
under which we include the Church of the circumcision 
in Judea, up to the final scattering of the people, ended 
the personal intercourse of angels with the children of 
men in the flesh ; and those concerning whom we are 
now to speak were Jews. 

When our Lord was about to ascend into heaven, his 
disciples, true to their national feelings and scriptural 
expectations, asked him, " Lord, wilt thou at this time 



240 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS % 



restore again the kingdom unto Israel V But that pe- 
riod was yet far distant, and he answered them, " It is 
not for you to know the times or the seasons which my 
Father hath put in his own power." Acts i. 6, 7. It 
was enough that the promise had been given, and that 
the restoration of the kingdom of Israel was sure ; but 
a militant, not a triumphant, church, was that of which 
they were to be constituted pillars ; and they must sow 
in tears, in humiliations, persecutions, afflictions, and 
distresses, the great harvest to be reaped when the King 
should come, and all his saints with him, to that restored 
kingdom. 

The Lord was parted from thera : a cloud received 
him up out of their sight ; but they were loth to believe 
he was indeed gone. Knowing him of a certainty as 
their Messiah, and also knowing that their Messiah 
would assuredly be a deliverer, a prince, a ruler, over 
the Jewish nation in particular, while his dominion 
should extend throughout the whole earth, they who 
had now seen the great work of man's redemption per- 
fected, looked for the glorious sequel, of which they 
knew that a leading sign would be the restoration of the 
kingdom to Israel. They seem to have expected that 
he would no longer delay this great consummation, but 
fulfil now his own and his Father's repeated promise ; 
and the ascension of their Lord left them very desolate, 
disappointed, perhaps shaken in faith. " They looked 
stedfastly towards heaven as he went up ;" and from the 
context we may infer, that their feeling was one of dread 
and dismay. Can he have forsaken us % Is Israel not 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 241 

to be gathered 1 will he not even now relent, and return 
and finish the mighty work 1 or can it be that we have 
suffered so many things in vain, and are now left to 
mourn a hope that has mocked us ? must we take up the 
language of Jeremiah, and say, " 0, the hope of Israel, 
the Saviour thereof, why shouldest thou be as a stranger 
in the land, and as a wayfaring man, that turneth aside 
to tarry for a night ? Why shouldest thou be as a man 
astonished, as a mighty man that cannot save? yet thou, 
O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy 
name ; leave us not." Jer. xiv. 8, 9. That their se- 
cret thoughts were of this complexion we have every 
reason to suppose, from what follows: "And while they 
looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, 
two men stood by them in white apparel ; which also 
said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into 
heaven ? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you 
into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have 
seen him go into heaven." Acts i. 10, 11. To gaze after 
their Lord, to keep their eyes fixed on that spot whither 
He, their only help in time, their only hope in eternity, 
was gone, and to contemplate the pathway by which 
He, their forerunner, had even then entered beyond the 
veil, to appear in the presence of God for them, was 
surely natural and seemly : but their feeling was pro- 
bably so far tinctured with dismay and doubt, as to call 
forth the gentle remonstrance of these two angels, who 
lingered behind their fellows to bear a message of con- 
solation to the perplexed disciples, that should be for the 
encouragement of the Church until the Lord come. 

After this we have many instances of the care and 
21 



242 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



diligence with which the angels fulfilled their ministry 
to the Church in Jerusalem. When the apostles, by 
their preaching and miracles, had so roused the indigna- 
tion of the High Priest and the Sadducees, that they 
laid hands on them, and put them in the common prison, 
" the angel of the Lord by night opened the prison- 
doors, and brought them forth, and said, Go, stand and 
speak in the temple to the people all the words of this 
life." Acts v. 19, 20. This deliverance was wrought 
in so quiet a manner, that no one was aware of it until the 
next day : the doors were shut, and the keepers stand- 
ing before them when the officers came, who were sent 
to bring the prisoners before their cruel and unjust 
judges. Yet even this marked deliverance had no ef- 
fect on the hardened opposers of God's word ; all, save 
Gamaliel, were disposed to slay them, and when, by 
God's providence, that was overruled, they were beat- 
en and threatened, and commanded to speak no more 
in the name of Jesus. In the beautiful narrative of 
Stephen, no mention is made of angelic ministry, al- 
though we cannot doubt that they surrounded on all 
sides the heavenward steps of the proto-martyr ; but in 
the persecution that followed his death, we find them 
actively employed in aiding the spread of the Gospel. 
" The angel of the Lord spake unto Philip saying, Arise 
and go toward the south, unto the way that goeth down 
from Jerusalem unto Gaza which is desert." Acts viii. 
26. This embassy was for the conversion of the Ethio- 
pian ; who was evidently a proselyte to Judaism ; but 
soon another Gentile was to be brought into the fold, a 
pagan, and one holding a command that would, of ne- 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 243 

cessity, often render him liable to act as an enemy 
against the Lord's people. He was, however, a sincere 
believer in God, as the creator and preserver of men ; and 
He who has said, " Unto him that hath it shall be given, 
and he shall have more abundantly," was now to be re- 
vealed to him, as the Redeemer, the merits of whose all- 
sufficient sacrifice rendered the prayers and alms of the 
devout Roman officer acceptable before God. Being 
in Cesarea, "he saw in a vision evidently about the 
ninth hour of the day, an angel of God coming in to 
him, and saying unto him, Cornelius. And when he 
looked on him he was afraid, and said, What is it, Lord ? 
and he said unto him, thy prayers and thine alms are 
come up for a memorial before God. And now send 
men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose surname 
is Peter ; he lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose 
house is by the seaside.: he shall tell thee what thou 
oughtest to do." Acts x. 3 — 6. Thus, by angelic min- 
istry, were the Gentiles first called into a participation 
with the children of Israel in the rich blessings and priv- 
ileges of the Gospel. 

It is indeed customary to date that event from the 
visit of the eastern wise men to Bethlehem ; but con- 
cerning them, Scripture tells us nothing ; and it is quite 
as probable, that they were descendants from some of 
the scattered tribes as that they were of Gentile origin. 
Respecting Cornelius, no doubt exists : the summons 
sent to Peter by the angel's direction, was the immedi- 
ate cause of breaking down the middle wall of partition ; 
God showed that unto the Gentiles too he had granted 



244 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



repentance unto life ; salvation was of the Jews ; but 
through their mercy all nations of the world, " all the 
families of the earth," were to obtain mercy. Hence- 
forth it was seen, that in Christ Jesus, neither circum- 
cision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision. The na- 
tional promises remain firm, unbroken, unrecalled, and 
shall be, to their fullest extent, most gloriously fulfilled 
to the whole house of Jacob ; the land of Canaan, the 
city of Jerusalem, shall be their's, in full, exclusive, un- 
alienable possession ; but every spiritual advantage be- 
comes alike the property of the believer, of whatsoever 
name, or blood, or nation he be. In Christ Jesus, there 
is neither male nor female : the woman's natural posi- 
tion is still that of subordination : she is commanded to 
obey, to honour the man, to call him lord, to reverence 
her husband, and to learn in silence with all subjection ; 
but in Christ Jesus her privileges are precisely the same 
as his : equally a child of God, equally an heir of salva- 
tion, equal with the man and with the angels too, in the 
resurrection from the dead. So with Jew and Gentile ; 
the former has a rank, a headship, a precedence, not to 
be done away with, as regards present things, only held 
back from him so long as he withholds his fealty from 
his promised Messiah ; but this is an earthly distinction ; 
and in Christ Jesus — that is, in the full participations 
of all the blessings promised to believers, as there is 
neither male nor female, so is there neither Jew nor 
Gentile. The woman does not, on embracing the Gos- 
pel, become a man, nor the Gentile a Jew. Much con- 
fusion exists, perplexing and misleading good people on 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 245 

this point. The Lord's returning mercy to Israel will 
speedily clear it up : but it is very desirable to see it 
correctly now. 

Cornelius, in relating to Peter the cause of his send- 
ing for him, says, " A man stood before me in bright 
clothing." Some supernatural radiancy surrounded the 
celestial messenger, that even in the light of mid-day 
so shone as to make the bold soldier afraid. It is a 
strange and sad proof of our conscious impurity, that 
it makes us shrink back from what is glorious and love- 
ly, as though it could have no fellowship with us, but 
must regard us with displeasure. Such was not man's 
nature when God originally created him ; such it will 
not be when, being saved by faith, he has attained to the 
resurrection, and put on the glorified body that claims an 
equality with the angels in heaven. 

The next appearance of one of theso ministering 
spirits is on an occasion of surpassing interest. James, 
the brother of John, had been slain with the sword, 
and Herod perceiving it pleased the Jews, then, alas ! 
given over to a reprobate mind, proceeded to take Peter 
also. The experience which they already had of the 
Apostle's marvellous escapes from persecuting hands, 
seems to have rendered them very cautious, for no fewer 
than four quarternions of Roman warriors were con- 
sidered a sufficient guard for this poor, fettered, Galilean 
fisherman. But all the power of Rome, in that her 
proudest day, was of no avail against the mighty weapon 
wielded on the prisoner's behalf; for "prayer was 
made without ceasing of the Church unto God for him." 
21* 



246 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 



" And when Herod would have brought him forth, the 
same night Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, 
bound with two chains : and the keepers before the door 
kept the prison." Acts xii. 5, 6. The two soldiers, it 
would seem, were asleep, as well as their captive ; and 
the fetters that bound him were so secured to them 
that he could not possibly have moved from his place 
without rousing them. " And behold, the angel of the 
Lord came upon him, and a light shined in the prison : 
and he smote Peter on the side, and raised him up, 
laying, Arise up quickly. And his chains fell off from 
his hands. And the angel said unto him, Gird thyself, 
and bind on thy sandals : and so he did. And he saith 
unto him, Cast thy garment about thee, and follow me. 
And he went out, and followed him ; and wist not that 
it was true which was done by the angel, but thought 
he saw a vision. When they were past the first and 
the second wards, they came unto the iron gate that 
leadeth unto the city ; which opened to them of his 
own accord : and they went cut, and passed on through 
one street ; and forthwith the angel departed from him. 
And when Peter was come to himself, he said, Now I 
know of a surety, that the Lord hath sent his angel, and 
hath delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from all 
the expectation of the people of the Jews." Acts xii. 7 — 
11. The power of the angelic deliverer, in this instance, 
is very strikingly set forth ; and the tangibility of the 
whole event is directly opposed to a mere vision. The 
angel smote Peter on the side to rouse him from sleep ; 
and though the unlocking of the fetters from his hands, 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 247 



and of the great gate of the prison, seems to have been 
an act of God's sovereign will, without any instrumen- 
tality, it is impossible to regard the angel, in this case, 
as a mere seeming, an incorporeal essence, not seen by 
the bodily, but the mental or spiritual eyes of the 
Apostle. 

Not long after this, vengeance overtook the cruel 
tyrant, who had hoped to glut his own and the people's 
thirst for blood by slaying Peter. We read, " Upon a 
set day Herod arrayed in royal apparel, sat upon his 
throne, and made an oration unto them. And the 
people gave a shout saying, It is the voice of a god, 
and not of a man. And immediately the angel of the 
Lord smote him, because he gave not God glory : and 
he was eaten of worms, and gave up the ghost." Acts 
xii. 21 — 23. Probably the same angel who delivered 
Peter, might be commissioned to execute this punish- 
ment on the persecutor of the Church ; but by whatever 
hand the judgment came, it was a solemn warning to 
men ; and seeing how the angels rendered praise to the 
Most High, in the hearing of John, for the appropri- 
ateness of his retributive visitation, we may well be- 
lieve that every s-pectacle of chastisment inflicted on 
sinners is a call for renewed thankfulness and praise on 
the part of the angels who have been kept faithful to 
their heavenly King, while others fell into guilt and 
terrible condemnation. " By the Church," they learn 
a vast deal that redounds to the glory of God, and to 
their own encouragement in the path of obedience. 
When Paul, oppressed by the multitude of trials wrote 



248 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



those words to the arrogant Church of Corinth puffed 
up with their gifts, I think that God hath set forth us 
the Apostles last* as it were appointed to death : for we 
are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and 
to men : we are fools for Christ's sake, but ye are wise 
in Christ ; we are weak, but ye are strong ; ye are 
honourable, but we are despised : even unto this present 
hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and 
are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place ; and 
labour, working with our own hands : being reviled, we 
bless : being persecuted, we suffer it ; being defamed, 
we entreat ; we are made as the filth of the world, and 
are the offscouring of all things unto this day. 1 Cor. 
iv. 9 — 13. When he wrote these words, he described 
the means by which God was at that time instructing 
not only the world and the Church, but the angels in 
heaven. The spectacle of such sufferings, combined 
with such constancy, patience, zeal, and love, was re- 
dounding to the glory of God, who out of the pitiable 
weakness of frail and fallen humanity, made strong 
his servants, and provided that his Son who had been 
" seen of angels," should be so effectually " preached 
to the Gentiles," that he was believed on in the world. 
His manifold wisdom was made known even to the 
principalities of heaven, by rendering the most foolish 
things of earth sufficient to baffle all the cunning, and 
to tread under foot all the powers of hell. Angelic minis- 
try was indeed sometimes employed, as if to remind the 
suffering disciples, how much sympathy existed towards 
them in the unseen world, when often on earth no man 



THE APOSTLES A SPECTACLE TO ANGELS. 249 

/ 

stood by them ; but in general the Lord wrought to- 
wards them and in them of his own sovereign, direct 
power ; while the angelic host looked on and adored his 
condescending mercy to the children of the dust. 

We have one more instance on record of the actual 
appearance of an angel to the favoured Apostle of the 
Gentiles ; and that is on an occasion of peril so wild, 
and destitution so entire, that imagination can scarcely 
picture anything beyond it. Paul, having escaped the 
hands of the Jews at Jerusalem, and endured an impris- 
onment of more than two years at Coesarea, was at length 
shipped for Italy, that he might, as the Lord had shown 
him in a vision, bear witness of Him in Rome also. A 
tedious voyage, the latter part of which was undertaken 
against the prophetic warning of Paul, brought them at 
length into the most iminent danger : they were tossed 
helplessly on a tempestuous sea, in a great storm of 
such long continuance, that for fourteen days the mari- 
ners had not even found time or spirits to eat, and all 
were reduced to utter despair, the prisoner Paul stood 
forth, and after gently rebuking them for despising his 
former caution, went on, " And now I exhort you to be 
of good cheer ; for there shall be no loss of any man's 
life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by 
me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom 
I serve, saying, Fear not, Paul ; thou must be brought 
before Caesar : and lo, God hath given thee all them 
that sail with thee, wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer : 
for I believe God that it shall be even as it was told me." 
Acts xxvii. 22 — 25. 



250 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS. 



With the narrative of this gracious deliverance, and 
Paul's subsequent abode at Rome, a chained and guard- 
ed captive, the inspired history of the early church con- 
cludes. Very shortly after this its first age, corruptions 
crept in, and men were so ready to forge the seal of 
God's authority for their own vain imaginings, that in 
the absence of the original stamp we have no warrant 
for giving credence to any recorded interposition from 
above. Such may have been vouchsafed ; but if we 
cannot now invalidate, neither can we authenticate it, 
and we leave off where the Lord saw good to close the 
testimony of what is past ; we have only to notice what 
is yet for to come. 



IX. 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 



For many hundreds of years our earth has been un- 
visited by angels, so far as the testimony of man's bodily 
senses is concerned : but the same faith by which we 
know that the worlds were made, that faith which is the 
evidence of things not seen, assures us that with unre- 
mitting care and tenderness the ministering spirits of 
heaven minister unto them that shall be heirs of salva- 
tion ; and our daily experience bear testimony that on 
many an occasion where dangers the most menacing 
have beset our path, or difficulties the most bewildering 
have perplexed it, we have had reason to confess with 
gladness of heart that " the angel of the Lord encampeth 
about them that fear him, and delivereth them." In how 
many instances this occurs where we never are conscious 
of having escaped a perilous, or struck into a safe path 
in time of danger, through the watchfulness of our unseen 
friends, we shall perhaps learn when admitted into their 
happy fellowship forever. 



252 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



But the time approaches when a great multitude of 
the heavenly host is again openly to visit earth, attend- 
ants on the triumphant state of Him whose lowly birth 
in a stable once brought to men's ears their hymns of 
thanksgiving to God. As the end of this dispensation 
draws nigh, we are taught to expect that the angels will 
take an exceedingly active part in what is going for- 
ward ; and, first, we may refer to our Lord's discourses 
on this subject. In explaining the parable of the tares 
and the wheat, he says, " The harvest is the end of the 
world, and the reapers are the angels. As therefore 
the tares are gathered and burned in the fire ; so shall 
it be in the end of this world : the Son of Man shall 
send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his 
kingdom all things that offend, and them that do ini- 
quity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire : there 
shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." Matt. xiii. 39 — 
42. On another occasion, when speaking not in para- 
bles, but in a strain of prophetic description, our Lord 
also showed the office reserved for the angels in refer- 
ence to his own people. " And there shall appear the 
sign of the Son of Man in heaven : and then shall all 
the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the 
Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven, with power 
and great glory : and he shall send his angels with a 
great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together 
his elect, from the four winds, from one end of heaven 
to the other." Matt, xxiv. 30, 31. This "great sound 
of a trumpet," is also mentioned by St. Paul, 1 Thess. 
iv. 16. " For the Lord himself shall descend from 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 253 



heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and 
the trump of God." The two-fold office of gathering 
together the elect, and of gathering out all that do iniqui- 
ty, is likewise set forth very strongly in the Revelation : 
" And I saw another angel ascending from the east, 
having the seal of the living God : and he cried with a 
loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to 
hurt the earth and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth, 
neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the 
servants of our God in their foreheads." Rev. vii. 2, 3. 
But a more remarkable parallel appears in another part, 
where the time referred to is evidently the same with 
that spoken of by our Lord, namely, the end of the pre- 
sent dispensation. We have there a harvest, first of 
the Lord's elect, then of his enemies. " And I looked, 
and behold, a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat 
like unto the Son of Man, having on his head a golden 
crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. And another 
angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice 
to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle and 
reap ; for the time is come for thee to reap ; for the har- 
vest of the earth is ripe. And he that sat on the cloud 
thrust in his sickle on the earth ; and the earth was 
reaped." Rev. xiv. 14 — 16. This is clearly the gather- 
ing in of the wheat — the elect ; the Lord's harvest of 
his redeemed people. What immediately follows cor- 
responds with the destruction of the tares. " And an- 
other angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, 
he also having a sharp sickle : and another angel came 
out from the altar, which had power over fire ; and cried 
22 



254 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, 
Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of 
the vine of the earth ; for her grapes are fully ripe. 
And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and 
gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great 
wine-press of the wrath of God." Verse 17 — 19. 

Again, while three unclean spirits go forth from the 
mouths of the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet, 
unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to 
gather them to the battle of that great day of God Al- 
mighty, we find it is an angel who loudly summons all 
the fowls of heaven to gather themselves together to 
eat the flesh of these rebellious kings, their captains, 
and their hosts. Rev. xvi. 13, 14 ; and xix. 17, 18. 

From all this we may certainly infer that in every 
event connected with the final triumph of the church, 
and discomfiture of her foes, angelic agency will be em- 
ployed to a very great extent. Even if it were admitted 
that we must view symbolically what is said of the an- 
gels in the mysterious book last quoted, (which we do 
not admit,) we cannot suppose that our Lord also spoke 
in a figure. So far from it, the " wheat " and the " tares " 
and the " reapers " were figurative, but the " children of 
the kingdom," the "children of the wicked one," and 
the " angels " were the actual beings referred to under 
those similitudes. We may quite as reasonably deprive 
the two former classes of their personal identity as the 
latter : just as properly take saints and sinners for 
imaginary beings as angels, as well doubt that the elect 
shall be finally admitted to glory, and the condemned 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 255 



sent into punishment, as that angels shall be the real 
instruments employed in conveying both to their re- 
spective destinations. If we had nothing else to point 
to, those few words would settle the question. " The 
field is the world ; the good seed are the children of 
the kingdom, but the tares are the children of the 
wicked one ; the enemy that sowed them is the devil ; 
the harvest is the end of the world, and the reapers are 
the angels." * 

That the closing scene then, of the present dispensa- 
tion will be accompanied with a visible display of the 
hosts of heaven in great numbers, we can hardly doubt ; 
those whom our Lord, then seated on the throne of his 
glory, shall confess or deny " before the holy angels," 
will certainly see those witnesses of their doom ; and 
during the tremendous events that usher in this judg- 
ment, while Satan and his legions are using every pos- 

* It is worthy of note too, as connecting this period of univer- 
sal activity on the part of the angels with other Scriptures, that 
no two words can be more different in their signification, than 
those which our translators have all rendered by the same term 
" world." In the first instance, " The field is the world the 
Greek word expresses distinctly this terraqueous globe, the ma- 
terial, visible earth in which we live ; but in the latter clause 
where we find it translated " the harvest is the end of the world," 
in the original it is u the completion of the age,'' Xosmos, the 
world, has no affinity whatever with Aion, the age : and not only 
here, but in all parallel passages we find the same event, i. e., the 
great harvest of the Lord, the day of his coming, spoken of by 
the term aion, proving that a great crisis in the order of things, 
not the destruction of the earth, is pointed at. 



256 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



sible device to stimulate the rebellious bearing of har- 
dened sinners, to confirm the doubtful in their unbelief, 
and to deceive the elect, these powerful and beneficent 
spirits, acting under an immediate command from their 
gracious King, will indeed encamp around his people. 
We may comprehend in some measure the necessity of 
such a constant guard in our present comparatively safe 
and easy state, and take comfort in knowing that so it 
is with us, if we truly love the Lord ; but how unspeak- 
ably precious will then be the thought of his having 
given his angels charge concerning us, to keep us in 
all our ways, when earthquakes and storms, signs and 
wonders, false Christs and false prophets abound, to 
terrify or to mislead us ! Many a defenceless child of 
God, finding himself, like Elisha in Dothan, accom- 
panied by foes too numerous and too strong for him to 
contend against, will take comfort from knowing, and 
perhaps on some occasions, seeing that chariots and 
horses of fire, and flaming swords wielded by hands of 
angelic strength, are arrayed on his side. When Satan 
puts forth his utmost might in the rage of a last, de- 
spairing struggle, against the Lord his conqueror, and 
the little flock that are about to bruise the great enemy 
under their feet, we may be assured that the zeal of 
"God's host" will be roused, and their love inflamed 
in a proportionate degree, contemplating as they will do, 
the manifold wisdom of God in the dangers, deliveran- 
ces and final glory of his church, while they execute the 
gracious purposes of his tender compassion towards the 
poor sheep of his pasture, appointed by wicked spirits 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 257 

and evil men, to be slain. It is, indeed, an overwhelm- 
ing thought, what the aspect of this world will be, when, 
for a season, the restraint is taken off that now hold the 
wills of fierce and crude men within bounds ; when the 
heathen, that is, all who are not Christ's, rage, and their 
kings and rulers conspire together to cast off the gov- 
ernment of the Most High, and to root out his domin- 
ion from the earth, " Except those days should be short- 
ened, there should no flesh be saved." For the elect's 
sake they will be shortened, and the harvest will be 
brought in more quickly than men expect ; but under 
what circumstances will the angels divide and gather 
out the good seed from among the tares of the field ? 
We know how Lot and his family were rescued from 
Sodom ; we know how Noah and his household were 
shut into the ark, ere the waters of the flood lifted it up 
from the earth ; and we know, though not from the page 
of inspiration, how the Christians were delivered from 
Jerusalem's dreadful destruction, by a temporary move- 
ment of the besieging army, who never dreamed of as- 
sisting them, but who thereby enabled them to flee to a 
place of safety. An ark, a Zoar, a pillar, there will al- 
ways be to shelter that church, against which the gates 
of hell shall not prevail ; and the Lord will send such 
guidance that his poor trembling flock of way-farers 
" though fools shall not err therein." 

But it is when the Lord shall personally come again, 
in like manner as his disciples saw him go up into hea- 
ven, that the innumerable company of angels will be re- 
vealed. Such is the declaration, " The Lord himself 
22* 



258 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



shall be revealed from heaven, with his mighty angels, 
in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not 
God, and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus 
Christ." 2 Thess. i. 7, 8. Then shall the splendid 
imagery of the Psalms and prophetic writings be ful- 
filled, and much more than fulfilled ; for what language, 
even of inspiration, can convey to our weak and dark- 
ened minds any realizing idea of those things of which 
eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor heart conceived, 
the terrible magnificence 1 One angel, described only 
as " a man in bright clothing," made the bold and pious 
Roman centurion afraid ; another by the exhibition of 
his angelic knowledge and love so overpowered the 
mind of the holy John, that he would have offered him 
worship, due to God alone. What then must be the 
full display of all that is dazzling in the Lord's trium- 
phant hosts, when thousands of thousands shall stand 
before him, and ten thousand times ten thousand minis- 
ter unto him ? Their lively interest in all that concerns 
us, a race of creatures infinitely every way inferior to 
them, save only through the high exaltation of our na- 
ture by its union with Deity in the person of Christ, and 
the heavenly privileges thereby secured to his believing 
people, is matter of wonder ; and whether they swell 
the chorus of praise over the ruins of the great harlot 
city, Rome, or spread the joyous tidings that Jerusalem 
is rebuilt, and again inhabited by her long lost children ; 
or hover round the heavenly city itself, the abode of 
those who have attained to the resurrection from the 
dead, with that song of angelic sympathy, " Let us be 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 259 

glad and rejoice, for the marriage of the Lamb is come," 
we shall be obliged to confess that they, respecting whom 
we have been accustomed to think so little ; who have 
been watching the progress of all that regards us with 
unwearied diligence, and unfailing care, and whose loud- 
est song of praise to their eternal King hails him the 
Lamb that was slain, — slain for our redemption, — have 
such a claim on our love and gratitude, as can never be 
properly estimated, until, seeing our Lord as He is, we 
also see them as they are, and remember how inces- 
santly, how willingly, they ministered to us, through the 
long years of our unsteady, perverse, inconsistent course ; 
contending with our foes, keeping guard over our steps, 
and finally thronging to welcome us to a full participa- 
tion in all the glories of their own heavenly home. 

This refers to the final period of the present dispen- 
sation, when we expect that lie who is gone to receive 
for himself a kingdom will return to establish it on earth. 
There has, however, been a spiritual coming of the 
Lord Jesus to his people from the beginning, while the 
call to enter into the eternal world has successively 
reached them. When a believer departs to be with 
Christ, he becomes a resident in the celestial Jerusa- 
lem, entering into the peaceful rest of heaven, where 
Christ also sitteth at the right hand of the Majesty on 
high, there to abide, until with all the other saints, he is 
summoned to attend his Lord, and to be re-united to 
the body which he once left below. In this transition 
of the departing soul, it is certain that angels are al- 
ways present not merely as spectators, but as most ac- 



260 OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 

tive messengers of Christ. It is difficult to speak of 
the state in which a disembodied spirit finds itself, on 
launching into eternity : it is one of those things which 
every one is certain to know by experience, but which 
none can foreknow by any effort either of wisdom, or 
knowledge, or the most vivid imagination. The sepa- 
rate existence of souls, of every soul of every human 
being, from Adam, to the last of his posterity who shall 
taste death, is not even questionable by any who believe 
in the revelation of God ; and that all who have already 
lived and died, are now in companionship either with 
angels or devils, awaiting the resurrection of the body, 
either to life or to damnation, is also very plainly set 
forth in Scripture. To Abraham's bosom, to the rest 
and happiness enjoyed by faithful Abraham, the angels 
bore Lazarus ; while the rich man, we are distinctly 
told, went to hell ; and what is most remarkable, the 
angel who showed John the wonderful things related in 
the Apocalypse, so identified himself with the prophets, 
and other obedient servants of Christ, as almost to do 
away the distinction between an angel and a glorified 
saint. Nor is this a solitary instance : our Lord, speak- 
ing of the claim that little children have on the tender- 
ness and care of Christians, says, " I say unto you, that 
in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my 
Father which is in heaven." Matt, xviii. 3 0. And when 
the damsel who went to hearken at the gate affirmed that 
she had seen Peter there, the other disciples, assured 
that he was either imprisoned in fetters or slaughtered, 
explained it, by saying, M It is his angel." Many inge- 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 261 

nious theories have been started on this ground ; but 
when all has been said that man can say, we are author- 
ized only to receive what bears upon it the infallible 
and indelible stamp of truth, " Thus saith the Lord." 

That in heaven the spirits of justified men abide with 
angels, is quite indubitable on Scripture ground ; but 
we are also warranted to believe, that they enjoy, occa- 
sionally at least, the angelic privilege of visiting earth, 
or of beholding clearly what goes on in the militant 
church. Otherwise, how could the souls under the 
altar know that their blood was not yet avenged on 
them that dwell on the earth? And why, if for ever 
divorced from all the ties of mortality, should they ex- 
press impatience for the arrival of that time? Assuredly 
not from any vengeful feeling : such is forbidden in just 
men in the flesh, and cannot reside in the spirits of just 
men made perfect. Besides, the generation on whom 
their blood was to be avenged, was probably not the 
same as the generation who shed it. We can only un- 
derstand it as expressing a fervent desire for the speedy 
arrival of that day of vengeance which we know syn- 
chronizes with the year of the redeemed. Those souls 
beheld and mourned over the desolate state of the Lord's 
still persecuted Church ; the devoted litle flock to which 
they also belonged ; and knowing that He would at once 
put all enemies under his feet, and exalt his Church to 
,glory and everlasting peace, they pleaded for the hasten- 
ing of that promised day. 

Another instance, of which it cannot be said that it 
was figurative, as may be objected to the foregoing, is 



262 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



the appearance of Moses and Elias on the mount with 
our Lord, in glorified bodies. Elias, indeed, did not 
die : he took his own body with him ; but Moses died 
and was buried, though of his sepulchre no man know- 
eth to this day. Whether the body in which he then 
appeared was his own, raised again from death and the 
grave for a special purpose, or whether it was what the 
disciples meant when they talked of Peter's * angel,' we 
cannot possibly tell. This we know, the person was 
Moses, who had been dead for many generations, and 
he talked with our Lord, as also did Elias, concerning 
his decease, which he should accomplish in Jerusalem. 
They spoke of a coming event ; of the locality assigned 
to it in the purposes of God ; and, eminent as were 
these two lights of the Old Testament church, we have 
no pretence for supposing that what was clearly revealed 
to, and perfectly understood by them, in the state of 
blessedness to which they had attained, was concealed 
from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob ; from Noah, Daniel, and 
Job ; or from any who had, by the like precious faith, 
entered the presence of God ; with w hom is no respect 
of persons, and who often maketh the first last, and the 
last first. 

This may seem somewhat irrelevant to the precise 
matter before us ; but the connexion is very intimate. 
To every individual among the great multitude before 
the throne, have the angels of God been ministering 
spirits ; and seeing that the privilege of believers in the 
life to come is to be made like unto the angels, to be 
equal with the angels, and that " those also who sleep 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 263 

in Jesus will God bring with him," when "the Son of 
Man shall come in the glory of his Father, and of the 
holy angels," we are sure the departed saints shall with 
the angels bear a very conspicuous part in the proceed- 
ings of that day ; but we have a striking indication that 
they will not descend to earth as strangers long divorced 
from all its concerns, but as those who have like the 
ministering angels, with keen interest watched the pro- 
gress of the church below towards the final consumma- 
tion of all its hopes. 

The apostle Paul, after enumerating many of those 
who by faith obtained the heavenly inheritance, includes 
in the same company all who had borne testimony during 
their lives to the truth, and staid themselves on the pro- 
mises of God. He then shows that they had not yet 
obtained the promise to which all looked forward, but 
were kept waiting for us ; that is, for the whole multitude 
of them which shall be saved. He speaks of them in 
their present state as a great cloud of witnesses encom- 
passing us ; and points to the circumstance as calcula- 
ted to quicken us in " the race set before us," the same 
race wherein they also strove, and succeeded. As too 
often happens, the force of this beautiful passage is 
greatly weakened by the injudicious division into chap- 
ters of what was written continuously : but a little at- 
tention bestowed on these two chapters without any 
regard paid to such arbitrary disjoining, will present in 
a very glorious light the perfect union, and uninterrupted 
communion of the whole body of the elect from the 
time of Abel to the last period — the removing of those 



264 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS: 



things that may be shaken, and the final establishment 
of the kingdom that cannot be moved. It is very re- 
markable that he does not say to believers still in 
the flesh, Ye shall come, but, " Ye are come unto 
Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the 
heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of 
angels, to the general assembly and church of the first 
born, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge 
of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and 
to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the 
blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that 
of Abel." Heb. xii. 22—24. By faith the child of God 
enters into this community, embracing all that is of God, 
both in heaven and on earth ; and when he puts off his 
tabernacle of flesh, it is not to lose sight of what he has 
hitherto beheld, and to open his eyes on a different 
scene, but to take in all that before he saw not in addi- 
tion to that which he has already seen. Having passed 
the waves of this troublesome world, and obtained a 
sure footing on the heavenly shore, he does not in self- 
ish contentment turn his back upon his former com- 
panions, still struggling through the surge, but with deep 
interest contemplate their painful progress, and if so the 
Lord permit, joyfully unite with the ministering spirits 
who are commissioned to render such help as divine 
wisdom sees good, by their instrumentality to impart. 
This, carried a little way beyond what revelation sanc- 
tions, leads to perilous idolatry ; and so we find it was, 
even in the apostles' days : but what then ] If some 
of the unlearned and unstable wrest certain Scriptures 



ANGELIC MINISTRATIONS IN THE LAST DAYS. 265 

to their own destruction, are we, therefore, to shrink 
from receiving the whole word of God 1 There is no 
doctrine so wholesome, so pure, so essentially neces- 
sary to be believed, that by overstepping its prescribed 
bounds it may not be wrested to a fearful error, and 
some who will not entertain this exceedingly important 
and unspeakably encouraging subject of angelic minis- 
try, and the communion of saints, lest it lead them into 
unsafe paths, will dogmatize on the origin of evil, free- 
will, and the secret counsels of the Most High, until 
they totter on the extreme verge of most presumptuous 
sin. John's mistake is recorded for our warning, and 
the angel's gentle rebuke for our instruction ; and with 
these before him, what has the humble worshipper of 
God to fear from an attentive, thankful investigation of 
this lovely portion of the divine economy of grace ? 



23 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



We have now to survey what is made known on the 
subject of angelic triumph, when the final overthrow of 
all that impeded the universal extension of Christ's 
kingdom on earth, shall have terminated this dispensa- 
tion : and here indeed we trace the beautiful union once 
before displayed in their heavenly chorus, of " Glory 
to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will 
towards men !" The twenty-fourth Psalm contains a 
sublime foretaste of what we look for, while describing 
that glorious scene, the ascension of the Lord Jesus 
on high, leading captivity captive. There, the heralding 
angels cry, " Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be 
ye lift up, ye everlasting doors ; and the King of glory 
shall come in." Those from within the gates inquire, 
" Who is this King of glory ?" Not that they needed 
to be told ; no, they knew the Babe of Bethlehem, who 
from his lowly birth had been " seen of angels," of all 
the angels of God, and well were they prepared to cele- 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



267 



brate his return to the glory which he had with the 
Father before the world was : but they loved to draw 
forth the answering shout, ascriptive of praise to their 
God, " The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty 
in battle." And again the summons is sounded from 
those majestic and resplendent legions, advancing as 
they sing, " Lift up your heads, 0 ye gates, even lift 
them up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory 
shall come in." The shining multitude, the seraphim, 
the cherubim, who throng around those eternal gates, 
and perchance the spirits of the faithful resting there, 
once more demand, u Who is this King of glory V 9 and 
once more the thundering song peals out, " The Lord 
of Hosts, he is the King of glory." It is wonderful how 
habit familiarizes the human mind to what is calculated 
to overpower it. The grandeur of this passage, the 
imagery that it teems with is such, that man's Hp might 
well falter in appropriating the lofty strain, and his 
knee bow in unpremeditated adoration of the ascended 
King of glory ; but we hear it until we can scarcely 
bestow a thought on its surpassing splendour ; and yet 
in the pride of our cold unthankful hearts, affect to 
look down upon the glowing creatures who cease not 
day or night, audibly to pour forth the ardent devotion 
of theirs before the throne ; as though their rank were 
somewhat below ours. But the proudest heart will be 
humbled, and the coldest kindled into flame, when that 
awful hour arrives for the seventh angel to sound, and 
great voices in heaven proclaim, " The kingdoms of 
this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and 



268 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



of his Christ ; and he shall reign forever and ever :" 
when the Church in glory, that so long awaited the day 
of vengeance, the year of the redeemed, takes up the 
strain, and says, in prostrate adoration, " We give thee 
thanks, 0 Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, 
and art to come ; because thou hast taken to thee thy 
great power, and hast reigned." When a voice shall 
come out of the throne, saying, "Praise our God, all ye 
his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and 
great," and the call shall be responded to by the my- 
riads of holy angels, the innumerable multitude of ran- 
somed souls, the whole company of that rejoicing hea- 
ven and renovated earth, bursting forth, " the voice of a 
great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and 
as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Allelujah : 
for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth." 

That hour will come : and in the body, or out of the 
body, every soul of man shall witness its coming. How 
near it may be, we know not, but far distant it cannot 
be. A veil, the veil of our own darkened understand- 
ings, as yet conceals from us the glory that shall be re- 
vealed : and neither angel nor devil shall longer be 
invisible to our awe-struck gaze. The latter will pass 
into their fiery prison, and Satan will be cast fettered 
into his dungeon, and while heaven pours forth its 
dazzling legions, earth will be purified from all things 
that offend. 

When John saw the multitude arrayed in white robes, 
with palms in their hands, standing before the throne, 
and heard them loudly ascribe salvation to God and to 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



269 



the Lamb, he also saw all the angels fall upon their 
faces, and worship God, as their God. Wherever a 
note of praise is uttered by the Church, it awakes an 
echo throughout the untold legions of heaven. This 
sympathy will never cease ; and with what delight 
God's angels contemplate the approaching triumph of 
their glorious King, we are told in many ways. That 
magnificent strain of holy exultation, descriptive of the 
final ruin of the great harlot city of Rome, is repeated 
as being uttered by a voice from heaven ; probably of 
an angel also, for it is called another voice from heaven, 
immediately following that of an angel having great 
power, and lightening the earth with his glory, who 
cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, " Babylon 
the great is fallen, is fallen." It was an angel also, 
one of the seven who had poured forth the seven last 
plagues on the earth, who showed to John the heavenly 
city, guarded at its twelve gates, by the same number 
of angels. 

Here we may pause, to consider for a moment what 
is meant by this mysterious city ! Jt is often named in 
Scripture, as a place actually existing, but not on earth. 
Paul speaks of it to the Galatians, in direct contradis- 
tinction from the earthly Zion : "Jerusalem which now 
is, and is in bondage with her children ;" and " Jerusalem 
which is above, is free, which is the mother of us all." 
Gal. iv. 25, 26. It is difficult to conceive how, while 
one is indisputably a real, an existing, a material city, 
the other should be, a visionary thing, a mere name ; or, 
that while Hagar is represented as the figure of a reali- 
23* 



270 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



ty, Mount Sinai in Arabia, and that again of another 
reality, Jerusalem in Palestine, Sarah should only be 
the figure of a figure which has no substantial antitype. 
Again, in Heb. xii., he names it the city of the living 
God ; the heavenly Jerusalem : and John, in Rev. xxi. 
says the angel "carried me away in the Spirit, to a 
great and high mountain, and shewed me that great 
city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from 
God, having the glory of God." Our Lord also dis- 
tinctly mentions it : "I will write upon him the name of 
my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is 
new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from 
my God." Rev. iii. 12. Though not so plainly named, 
this Jerusalem is clearly intended also by Paul, when 
he says, Abraham " looked for a city which hath foun- 
dations, whose builder and maker is God." Heb. xi. 10. 
And again, " God is not ashamed to be called their 
God, for he hath prepared for them a city." Heb. xi. 16. 
In the beautiful discourse addressed by the Lord Jesus 
to his disciples, immediately before his betrayal, he 
says, " In my Father's house are many mansions ; if 
it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare 
a place for you ; and if I go and prepare a place for 
you, I will come again and receive you unto myself ; 
that where I am, there ye may be also." John xiv. 2, 3. 
Paul too says, " We know that if our earthly house of 
this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of 
God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the hea- 
vens : for in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be 
clothed upon with our house which is from heaven." 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



271 



2 Cor. v, 1, 2. Is not this the "holy Jerusalem " which 
John saw? The name imports " peace ;" or rather, it 
imports " where peace is seen :" and there is no ques- 
tion, among spiritual people, as to the fact of this new 
Jerusalem being the heavenly home of God's people ; 
but one very great discrepancy seems to exist between 
God's revelation and man's expectation : the latter ex- 
pects to bid an eternal farewell to earth, and to go to a 
place called heaven, somewhere in a vastly remote space, 
where all that he shall find will be totally dissimilar 
from aught that he has ever seen or heard of ; where he 
will be an etherealized, unsubstantial creature, among 
beings and things equally removed from all with which 
we are now conversant. Revelation, on the contrary, 
tells us of " a city," of " mansions," of foundations, 
walls, and gates, indescribably rich, bright and glorious 
indeed, but still answerable in some measure to what 
we are accustomed to ; and it invariably speaks of this 
heavenly abode as coming down, at the appointed time, 
to the region of our earth. Paul speaks of being 
" clothed upon with an house which is /rom," not in, 
" heaven :" our Lord says, u I will come, and receive 
you unto myself;" and the more minutely we inspect 
the Scriptures that bear upon the subject, the more we 
shall be struck by their harmonious bearing on the point. 

It is a point in which every individual is personally 
concerned ; and we may, without committing any pre- 
sumptuous sin, examine, each for himself, what God has 
seen good to reveal to all. We must remember that 
our Lord Jesus Christ took to himself a body which saw 



272 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS I 



no corruption ; that, in the same body with which he arose 
from the dead, and the identity of which he proved to 
Thomas, he ascended into heaven, and shall come again 
to judgment. Two of his people, Enoch and Elijah, 
also went to that unseen place in their material bodies ; 
and at the crucifixion of our Lord 44 The earth did quake, 
and the rocks rent ; and the graves were opened ; and 
many bodies of the saints which slept arose and came 
out of their graves after his resurrection, and went into 
the holy city, and appeared unto many." Matt, xxvii. 
51 — 53. Now it is perfectly natural and allowable to 
ask, where are all these bodies 1 Changed, no doubt ; 
their corruption having put on incorruption, and their 
mortal immortality, and made glorious, as was seen in 
Moses and Elias on the Mount ; but still the same bo- 
dies that they wore when on earth. And if in the Bible 
we find a satisfactory answer to that question, by being 
told of a glorious place r a city, a habitation, prepared 
and reserved for God's children, and in due time to 
be revealed, not only to them, but to all others, though 
no others shall ever find entrance into it, surely we may 
be allowed to take, in a more literal sense, the declara- 
tions so often repeated than that which good men have 
been in the habit of connecting with them. 

In all humility, then, we proclaim our belief, founded 
on many passages in the Bible, that a place, a real lo- 
cality exists, far beyond the present scope of our vision, 
but not necessarily invisible to mortal eye ; that to this 
place the glowing description given by John in the twenty- 
first chapter of the Revelation belongs : that it is the 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



273 



present abode of the Lord Jesus Christ, in his human 
body, and of those named in a passage more than once 
already quoted, an innumerable company of angels, the 
general assembly and Church of the first-born, the spi- 
rits of just men made perfect, and the bodies of such as 
have heretofore, for some special purpose, been raised 
from the dead. We believe that into this abode flesh 
and blood, in its unchanged state, shall not enter, but 
that it will, during the millennial period of the Church's 
peace and Satan's imprisonment, be fully visible to men 
upon the earth, among whom its happy inhabitants will 
have full freedom to intermingle,by the same facilities that 
placed Moses and Elias on the Mount, and brought the 
holy angels so often into companionship with man. We 
do believe that in this heavenly Jerusalem no distinction 
whatever subsists between Jew and Gentile, male and 
female, bond and free ; all being one in Christ Jesus, 
and like, and equal unto, the angels ; while in the earthly 
Jerusalem we certainly believe that the children of 
Abraham, according to the flesh, shall dwell under the 
acknowledged rule of their Messiah, possessed of every 
privilege that can belong to the citizens of the world's 
metropolis ; and invested with such honours and advan- 
tages as never yet were by any nation enjoyed. We 
believe that by a peculiar dispensation, frequently alluded 
to by our Lord and by the inspired writers, a subordi- 
nate rule, under Christ, will be exercised by the saints 
of the Church triumphant over the church still on earth ; 
while an intercourse no less frequent than are now the 
visits of those unseen ministering spirits, who have the 
charge over us to keep us in all our ways, will subsist 



274 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



between those who are, and those who are not yet per- 
fected in heavenly felicity. This view necessarily brings 
the holy angels forward as partaking richly in the trium- 
phant glories of Christ's reign : they will have gathered 
out the tares, gathered in the wheat, and have seen their 
rebellious fellows who kept not their first estate, con- 
signed to the abyss from whence they will no more es- 
cape ; or if permitted to share the short season of Satan's 
enlargement, and to aid in deceiving those whom he 
will finally assail, they will speedily be cast into the fiery 
pit forever. We are told that at the final judgment of 
all men, which follows this last outburst of Satanic ma- 
lignity, the earth and its heaven shall flee away, and no 
more peace be found for them ; but the holy Jerusalem 
is imperishable : it is a building of God, eternal in those 
heavens with which our globe has no necessary connex- 
ion. There, without a pause, the songs of the redeemed 
shall ascend ; there, without a night, the day of peace 
and joy shall endure : there at the gates, the " everlast- 
ing doors," angelic guards shall hold their safe and plea- 
sant post, evermore employed in the service of their 
glorious King. Blindly erring as now we do, in vain at- 
tempts fully to comprehend what it will require, new and 
enlarged faculties to take in, even when the things now 
unseen are displayed to our sight, we shall then see 
clearly, and know even as we are known. 

There is a practical application of this high and holy 
subject, the realities of the spiritual world, both angelic 
and satanic, that must not be overlooked. No action 
of our lives, nothing that we can do or say, is uncon- 
nected with the two classes into which those spiritual 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



275 



beings are divided. It fearfully aggravates sin to com- 
mit it-, as we do, in the presence of those whom the Lord 
has commissioned to watch over and to minister unto us, 
and who cannot but be very jealous for their divine 
Master's honour ; and in the presence too of those apos- 
tates who delight in our transgressions, because they 
dishonour God. How circumspectly should we walk, 
in many a case where now our ways are most inconsist- 
ent and perverse, if we could see the pure, bright search- 
ing eye of a holy angel intently fixed on us, with a desire 
to mark how the Christian glorifies his Master ; or if we 
caught the exulting leer of a devil, tracing out our crooked 
ways, or turned in mockery and scorn to the record of 
God's will, which we profess to follow, but from which 
we so perpetually swerve ! Both might address us in 
the same language, and ask, the one in sorrowful re- 
proach, the other in grinning exultation, " Is this thy 
kindness to thy friend ?" that friend who has done all 
for us, even to the sacrifice of himself, for our redemp- 
tion ; and who has given such large supplies of grace, 
and such unlimited promises of help, that we may walk 
worthy our high calling, and enable him to present his 
church to God, holy and without blemish, not having 
spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. To spot it, to wrinkle 
it, to pollute it, is the unceasing aim of Satan and his 
crew, while no created being can lend the smallest aid 
to stay the workings of sin, to palliate it when committed, 
or to supply a particle of help towards cancelling this 
debt. There is no moment of our lives when we are 
perfectly secure from the approach of evil spirits ; and 
though the Lord himself is ever present with his people, 



276 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



and his presence is all-sufficient to protect and to sustain 
them, yet we have clear intimations as has been shown 
in these pages, that against those who would harm us 
an adverse armament is arrayed, watchful, zealous, and 
filled with holy love and tender compassion for the feeble 
children of men. It is sweet to be able to say, by faith, 
what Paul said from actual right, on occasions of immi- 
nent danger and deliverance : " There stood by me 
the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve." It 
does not derogate from the omnipotence or the omnis- 
cience of the Most High, while it exceedingly enhances 
his gracious care for both parties, that he should depute 
his bright angels to render loving service to his people. 
On their part, we may be assured, it forms a very en- 
dearing tie ; and it is strange that we, who are the great 
gainers, should be so utterly indifferent to the revealed 
fact, as to pass weeks, months, and some perhaps years, 
without bestowing a thankful thought on the matter. 

Our notions of an earthly monarch's greatness are 
enlarged by observing that his sway extends over a 
multitude of subjects ; and that he has under his com- 
mand an exceedingly numerous, formidable, obedient, 
and beautifully disciplined army, so ordered as to hold 
effectually at bay a no less numerous hostile force, per- 
petually menacing his dominions. Nebuchadnezzar, 
himself a great king and conqueror, understood this ; 
and how striking is the reference he makes to that pe- 
culiar feature in the majesty of the divine government ! 
" He doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, 
and among the inhabitants of the earth : and none can 
stay his hand, or say unto him what doest thou V 9 Our 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



277 



views on this subject are rarely so enlarged as those of 
the Chaldean king. To judge by the tenour of religious 
books, and ministerial discourses in general, very little 
praise is rendered to God for revealing to us this branch 
of the glory of his kingdom. We use in our public 
worship that exceedingly beautiful and most scriptural 
hymn, the Te Deum ; and fluently recite, " To thee all 
angels cry aloud, the heavens and all the powers therein ; 
to thee, cherubim and seraphim continually do cry, 
Holy, holy, holy Lord God of Sabaoth !" What a scene 
would open to our mental and spiritual view every time 
we utter these words, if we habitually paid due attention 
to what the Lord God of Sabaoth, — of hosts, or armies, 
— has vouchsafed to show us in his word ! If all the 
imagery which we are so slow to remark was deduced 
from the Psalms of David, we should scarcely recog- 
nise them so altered, so impoverished would they become ; 
and instead of thrusting this precious doctrine into the 
shade, we should do well to bring it very prominently 
forward, even at the expense of some topics which usu- 
ally occupy a large share of attention, and which do but 
gender needless strife. We all, occasionally, are com- 
pelled to cry, Our soul cleaveth to the dust, and to ask 
for quickening grace, according to God's word ; but we 
make too little use of some of the means which that 
word supplies for contemplations of a most elevating 
character. If God's angels took no more thought for 
us than we do for them, we should go stumbling about 
the world in a very uncomfortable manner. 

With some it is a favourite plan to place the angels in 
24 



278 



OP THE HOLY ANGELS 



a position vastly subordinate, or at best inferior to that 
of the saints. Yet when our Lord took upon him our 
nature, even the sinless nature, wholly exempt from 
Adam's rebellious taint, he is said to have been made a 
little lower than the angels. Paul, reproving the Co- 
rinthians for going to law before the unjust, and not 
before the saints, reminds them that by the saints the 
world shall be judged ; and adds ? " Enow ye not that 
we shall judge angels V 7 1 Cor. vi. 3. This seems evi- 
dently to refer to the judgment of condemnation, the 
"judgment of the great day," mentioned by Jude, unto 
which the angels that kept not their first estate, but left 
their own habitation, are reserved. It does not warrant 
the assumption that God will make over to his saints 
the government of his angels. Another ground for this 
supposed exaltation over the heavenly host is alleged 
by some to be the closer proximity of the saints to the 
throne, as seen by John, where the angels are de- 
scribed as forming the outermost circle, (Rev. v. 11,) 
but surely this does not argue any thing. The officials 
who guard the king's palace are often of much higher 
rank than those admitted to the presence-chamber. Our 
Lord has distinctly said of his glorified saints, " they 
are equal unto the angels, and are the children of God, 
being the children of the resurrection." Luke xx. 36. 
With the prospect of such glorious equality, well may 
the sinful worms of earth rest thankfully contented. The 
angels are ministering spirits ; and their Master and 
ours came also 44 to minister." It is well to note these 
things : men are apt to adopt, without sufficient con- 
sideration, the notions of those who have perhaps bor- 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



27S 



rowed from preceding writers, and amongst them framed 
systems in which the plain word of scripture is less pro- 
minent than are their own glosses upon it. 

But whatever discoveries are reserved for the period 
when we shall know even as we are known, the present 
is a time to make use of what God has distinctly de- 
clared to us. We are in the world ; in that field where 
the devil is now plentifully sowing, and carefully foster- 
ing his tares, for the twofold purpose of diminishing the 
Lord's harvest, and heaping up fuel for the unquencha- 
ble flames in which the only solace of his own torments 
will be the sight of myriads suffering with him. His 
great seed time is while men sleep : they will awake 
but to find the strong hands of God's angels binding 
the weeds for their final doom. This is a solemn 
thought for those who are appointed to watch the field ; 
for kings, and persons in authority ; for bishops, and 
ministers of religion ; for parents, and the heads of 
every household ; for all, in fact, to whom is commit- 
ted the oversight of any fellow-creature. When they 
slumber at their posts, the enemy steals along, and in- 
jures their master's property, for which they must give 
account to him. 

Another point where Satan must be met and resisted 
is chiefly personal ; each individual must look to him- 
self. The seed of the word being sown by the great 
Husbandman, the devil is sure to come and endeavour 
to take it away, ere it can sink and be rooted in their 
hearts. He knows how needful is prayer, with medita- 
tion, to render effectual that precious seed ; and by a 
multitude of devices, he will seek to divert the mind 



280 



OF THE HOLY ANGELS : 



from such indispensable exercise. In this quarter the 
angels cannot oppose him ; they are not authorized to 
interfere, nor permitted to bear a part, in the mighty 
work of man's regeneration, conversion, sanctification : 
there God alone operates. Jesus is the author and the 
finisher, and only on him can the soul lean for help 
against the mighty. The wisest and most faithful of 
God's servants cannot always discern a blade of wheat 
from a tare : they are told both must grow together 
until the harvest ; lest in attempting to root out the 
weeds they pull up the good plants also ; the reapers, 
with whom is discernment for the task, will come forth 
at the appointed time, and effect the separation, but 
though they can gather in the whole harvest without 
letting fall a single ripe grain, still they have nothing to 
do with the seed-time, or with the secret growth of the 
plant. They cannot hinder the choking of the word by 
worldly cares and pleasures ; they cannot cause that to 
take root which falls where no depth of spiritual sus- 
ceptibility exists ; they cannot wrest from Satan's grasp 
what he has snatched away from the heedless hearer ; 
nor can they impart fertility to the heart of man, that it 
should so receive and retain as to bring forth fruit. So 
wonderfully has our gracious Lord guarded this and 
every other doctrine from abuse, that no humble, be- 
lieving hearer need fear for a moment to be led into 
error by conceding to the subject of these imperfect 
pages that prominence to which it is entitled, as occupy- 
ing a very important place in the revelations of God. 

We sometimes have the counsel gravely given to 
leave these things to learned men as being too high for 



ANGELIC TRIUMPH. 



281 



simple minds. The seventy disciples whom our Lord 
sent forth, we are told, returned to him with joy, because 
even the very devils were subject unto him through his 
name. They were simple, unlearned people, who, fully 
believing all that he had said, instead of sitting down to 
hold a learned disquisition on the nature of evil spirits, 
went and acted upon what he told them, commanding 
the devils in his name. He answers their glad com- 
munication by telling them that he beheld Satan as 
lightning fall from heaven ; he invested them with un- 
limited control over " all the power of the enemy," and, 
after cautioning them not to rejoice so much in this 
supernatural gift as in the knowledge that their own 
names were written in heaven. " In that hour Jesus 
rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, 
Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these 
things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed 
them unto babes : even so, Father ; for so it seemed 
good in thy sight." Luke x. 21. With this encourage- 
ment before us, with a perfect consciousness of being 
a mere babe in worldly wisdom and worldly prudence, 
and simply believing that every word spoken of God is 
true, we have fulfilled our task ; may it be as profitable 
to the soul of the reader, as the writer feels it has been 
to her own, while with the Bible, and nothing but the 
Bible, to guide her, she has endeavoured to trace the 
outlines of what can never be perfectly filled up, until 
the veil of mortality is withdrawn, which now withholds 
our eyes from contemplating in all its wondrous details, 
the mysterious world of spirits. 

24* 



CONCLUSION. 



" WATCH." 



" Deliver us from the evil One," is the prayer which 
our Lord has instructed us to put up ; and it is much to 
be regretted, that we are accustomed to use a different 
form of expression, calculated to withdraw our attention 
from the great personal adversary, and to present to our 
minds a vague notion of evil in general. Whatever 
isolates man, separating between him and the rest of 
God's creation, is inimical to his best interests. He 
looks on the inferior animals, and forgetting in how many 
respects their natural sensibilities resemble his own, he 
becomes their cruel oppressor. He dooms them to 
protracted hunger, and thirst ; he overworks them, until 
every sinew of their exhausted frames is wrung by the 
anguish of intolerable fatigue ; he breaks the endearing 
ties by which the Lord of all has seen good to sweeten 
their humble existence; and standing on a haughty 
eminence of superior intellect and conscious immortality, 
he degrades some of the most marvellous of God's works, 
using them as mere tools for the supply of his artificial 
wants, the gratification of his avaricious propensities ; 



" WATCH." 



283- 



until the whole creation, groaning and travailing in pain 
together, sends up a fearful cry into the ears of Him who 
from the glorious high throne of his eternal Majesty stoops 
to feed the young ravens that call upon him. Man was 
placed in dominion over the beasts of the field and the 
fowls of the air, that he might exercise a becoming vice- 
gerency, brethren as they all are of the dust out of which 
his own body is so curiously formed ; but Satan fills his 
mind with pride and hardens his heart against the plead- 
ings of natural feeling on behalf of those who have no 
voice to utter in their own cause ; and so, man, standing 
superciliously aloof from the creatures that his sin has 
subjected to vanity, works the work of devils in conni- 
ving at, if not wantonly inflicting, needless torments upon 
them. 

Again, as below, so above his own scale of being there 
are races with which he is nearly affianced : not corpo- 
really as here, but spiritually. These he cannot see, 
therefore he resolves to banish their existence from his 
thoughts. He is aware that of such superior creatures 
one class is ever about him for good, the other for evil ; 
but what little he may have incidentally gathered on that 
subject he heeds not : and as to inquiry, he considers it 
a worthier employment to explore the depths of the earth 
for the fossil remains of some extinct species of animals, 
which had he met with it alive he would probably have 
hunted to death for his barbarous sport, than to seek a 
clearer knowledge of those beings among whom he must, 
assuredly and inevitably, dwell to eternity. Such iso- 
lation, we repeat, is most injurious to man : God never 



284 



CONCLUSION. 



intended it for him. The record of creation, the repeated 
injunctions to mercy, and the beautiful provision made 
for its exercise under the glorious code of Israel's law, 
all declare on the one hand, as do on the other the many 
revelations given of angelic ministry and of Satanic 
malice, that man is not authorized to lose sight of his 
actual position as a link in the chain of created being. 

" Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation," 
said our blessed Lord. Against what were they to 
watch ] He had apprized them long before, when he 
taught them to pray, " Lead us not into temptation, but 
deliver us from the evil one," and had also put into 
their mouths a plea for being thus guarded, thus deliv- 
ered : " for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and 
the glory, forever." The evil one seeks to usurp God's 
kingdom within us, to stir us up in resistance to His 
power, and by our rebellion, our ungrateful, unblushing 
scorn of His pure law, to tarnish the glory that rests 
upon His Church. We pray that Satan may not suc- 
ceed in so seducing us into the robbery of God ; we 
pray to be delivered from his wiles ; and our prayer is 
accepted, if it be offered up in sincerity, the heart ac- 
companying the lips, and with a willingness on our part 
to watch against the approach of that from which we 
have prayed to be preserved. 

When the Christian, in pursuit of his lawful calling, 
finds himself entering those ways where the ungodly 
take counsel, and sinners walk, and scorners fix their 
seat, he knows that he must watch, and feels that he 
. must pray. Temptation will surely then assail him ; 



" WATCH." 



285 



the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of 
life, will each find its suitable incitement prepared : the 
fear of man, will bring one snare, the love of man an- 
other ; and he has no difficulty in realizing the presiding 
presence of Satan and his angels in the haunts of mam- 
mon or among the splendours of earthly pomp, or where 
contending parties strive for mastery in the field of 
worldly distinction. He does not love such scenes, but 
duty calls him into them, and he goes softly, humbled 
in spirit, wary in mind, taking heed lest, amid the abun- 
dance of stumbling-blocks, he should fall. Thus the 
six days of labour pass, and how joyful is the Sabbath 
dawn releasing him from such necessary exposure to 
temptation. He thinks, perhaps, with a sigh of com- 
passionate sorrow of those who, turning the grace of 
God into licentiousness, will certainly keep a sabbath to 
Satan, and use the day of release from worldly business 
as an especial opportunity for sinning greedily in other 
ways than those of covetousness and strife ; but he goes 
himself to the house of prayer, under a delightful con- 
viction that in seeking the sanctuary of God he flies from 
the presence of all his foes. 

And so he does ; but alas ! God has as yet no sanctu- 
ary on earth into which those foes cannot enter. There 
is nothing in consecrated walls to repel them ; nor is 
the most devotional frame of mind that man can bring 
himself into, a safeguard against their near approach. 
Rather does our consciousness of being on hallowed 
ground, and its attendant feeling of security, encourage 
the wily foe to do his boldest and his worst, where two 



286 



CONCLUSION. 



or three are gathered together, with Christ Himself in 
the midst, there stands Satan, or some trusty emissary 
of his, at their right hand, to resist them. We are not 
left to conjecture whether it be so or not ; our Lord dis- 
tinctly expresses it, when explaining the parable of the 
sower : " Then cometh the devil, and taketh away the 
word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be 
saved." Matt. viii. 12. This, indeed, refers to a case 
where no true faith exists ; but it proves that when the 
word is preached, Satan is at hand to render it of no 
effect ; and where is the Christian who has never real- 
ized the presence, even in the hour of real communion 
with God, of something over which he has had to mourn 
as being sadly opposed to that perfect spirituality of 
mind, that joy and peace in believing, which he knows 
he ought to attain unto 1 

We do not rightly estimate the enormous power of 
the enemy at those times and in those places where he 
may be considered as suffering an effectual check. A 
man may know " the plague of his own heart," but he 
will gain very little in his efforts to subdue it, if he thinks 
he has that alone to strive against. It is the Devil 
whom we are told to resist ; and if half the prayers 
that we put up against the evil of our nature, were di- 
rected against him, personally and by name, we should 
soon experience a relief that is now more hardly and 
more partially obtained. Inquiry into the character 
and extent of Satanic power, however successful, is no- 
thing without a vigorous application of the knowledge 
gained to our individual case : it is to reconnoitre an 



" WATCH." 



287 



enemy whom we do not intend to fight ; and who laughs 
at the pointing of our telescopes, if not followed up by 
the pointing of our guns. 

There are some who will be constrained to acknow- 
ledge, that the surest signal for distress and annoyance 
in every shape is the attempt to commence or to prose- 
cute some really good work : that so long as they give 
their attention to comparative trifles, or occupy them- 
selves in a way productive of no particular advantage, 
in spiritual things, to themselves or others, they go on 
with tolerable ease and comfort ; but let them attempt 
an aggressive movement on the Lord's side, and every 
thing is against them. There is no hinderance so great 
or so trivial, from the fracture of a limb to the mislay- 
ing or soiling of a sheet of paper, but it crosses their 
path ; no suggestion, from that which leads to most sin- 
ful anger, or rebellious murmuring, or dishonouring doubt 
of God's faithfulness, down to the silliest fancy that can 
attract the moment's thought, but it will come in their 
way. Persons, whose habits are the most studious, and 
whose thoughts need to be more especially abstracted 
from the passing events of the hour, will find in domes- 
tic confusion, the ailments of a family, the perverseness 
of servants, and the unreasonable encroachments of 
friends, sufficient to render their progress all but impos- 
sible ; and perhaps in the midst of such opposition as it 
seems bootless to contend against, they are conscious 
of a tendency within towards that impious murmur, " It 
is vain to serve God." 

In such a case, we pray for patience ; it is well, for 



288 



CONCLUSION. 



" Ye have need of patience." We ask more faith : it is 
better still, for 44 All things are possible to him that be- 
lieveth." We resolve to persevere through every ob- 
struction that can encumber our path ; and that is also 
meet and right, and our bounden duty, " for in due sea- 
son we shall reap, if we faint not." But what a relief 
should we often experience, what freedom in our on- 
ward course, by one fervent, believing, understanding 
aspiration in these appointed words, " Deliver us from 
the evil one !" 

One of the important uses of watchfulness combined 
with prayer, is to ascertain what form of supplication 
is most acceptable before the Lord. Now, Satan is the 
personal enemy of Christ in a sense, and to an extent 
that can be applied to no other. He is at once the ori- 
ginator, the director, and the leader of every species of 
rebellion in heaven and earth. When the Son of God 
took our nature upon him, and became in fashion as a 
man, Satan opposed him to his face, tempted, insulted, 
and finally used to the utmost his permitted power, in- 
stigating the treachery of Judas, the malignity of the 
Jews, and the cruelty of the Romans ; throughout the 
whole narrative of our Lord's suffering sojourn, we trace 
this accursed Spirit, not only in his deeds, but by name : 
and surely it behooves us to remember all this, and to 
put honour upon Him who came to destroy the works of 
the devil, by continually seeking His all-sufficient help 
against the conquered, but still mighty and dangerous 
adversary. 

It is when we would draw nigh to God, with an ear- 



"WATCH." 289 
• 

nest appeal against Satan, or persuade others so to do, 
that we find ourselves most furiously resisted in the out- 
set, most truly set at liberty in the end. It is when we 
resolve to fight neither with small or great, but only 
against him who is the king of the infernal hosts, that 
he will be discomfited, and his legions thrown into con- 
fusion. Not that evil in every shape ought not to be 
most stedfastly resisted, but he who is pointed out to us 
by that significant appellation, " Your adversary, the 
devil," is surely to be singled from the throng of which 
he is the head, and who all act in subordination to 
him. 

All God's people undergo temptation, though not at 
all times, yet so very frequently, and in so many differ- 
ent forms, that the presence of an evil influence must be 
almost continual, and the power of suggesting sinful 
or foolish imaginations must be widely possessed and 
exercised among the tempters. The mind has an eye, 
and before that eye pictures are held, sometimes consist- 
ing even of the most ordinary concerns of daily life, ac- 
companied with suggestions of an anxious, an irritating, 
a covetous, or other evil character, while the Christian 
is earnestly labouring after a composed spirit, and a 
collected mind for the service of the sanctuary. What- 
ever may be his usual occupations, his favourite studies, 
his prevailing wishes, these are so made use of as to 
oppose a bar between him and the simply devotional 
frame after which he longs, often intermixed with 
distressing doubts, vain speculations, and presumptuous 
reasonings connected, with the very duty that he is 
25 



290 CONCLUSION. 

engaged in. What a terrible display should we behold 
if the mist were suddenly dispelled, and our eyes opened 
to discern these devils at their work in the midst of a 
congregation, who probably consider themselves safely 
housed from any such intruders, and are therefore defi- 
cient in watchfulness against them ! One perchance, 
is in the pew, suggesting to the hearer disparaging 
thoughts of the minister, telling him, that such a style 
of preaching is not calculated to profit him, and that he 
should seek elsewhere an instructer better suited to his 
case ; while another in the pulpit whispers to the 
preacher that he is not in his proper sphere ; he has 
reaped too little fruit of his labour there to have any 
warrant for thinking it his destined post of usefulness, 
and thus the tie on both sides is weakened, and the 
enemy snatches away, even from the renewed heart, 
many a precious grain of gospel seed, calculated to in- 
crease sixty or a hundred fold, if rightly received and 
prayerfully retained. And thus he breaks many a tie 
that would prove a mutual blessing ; inducing a waver- 
ing mind and restless habits, often leading the humble, 
zealous pastor, eventually into some snare of popularity, 
some sphere where personal vanity is gratified at the 
expense of spiritual mindedness ; and he who began by 
desiring to know nothing but Jesus Christ and him cru- 
cified, ends by preaching himself, and not Christ 
Jesus. 

" Watch :" for wherever God has given a command or 
recorded a warning, there will Satan be at work. The 
first waking thought is often at his suggesting, "A little 



" WATCH." 



291 



more slumber, a little more sleep : a little more folding of 
the hands to sleep." Prov. vi. 10. The temptation suc- 
ceeds ; and at an hour too late for the due regulation of 
the day's employment, the man rises, dissatisfied with 
himself. The next step is to make this loss of time a plea 
for curtailing the season of private prayer, or a means of 
distracting the thoughts while in the act of supplication : 
nor can the loss of the morning hour so wasted be re- 
trieved during the day. In some characters, this leads 
to irritability of temper ; and too well can the invisible 
enemies, who are busily employed in following up the 
first advantage, use a word of unjust harshness to the 
detriment of many souls. In others, it induces despon- 
dency, idleness, or such a dispersion of thought as renders 
the day well nigh blank. It would be endless to follow 
out the customary plans of those against whom we must 
watch and pray ; the sure way to do so effectually is to 
bear in mind, that the Bible is Satan's directory, since 
it shows what God would have his servants to do and to 
be ; and to lead them into paths directly contrary to 
that revealed will, so that they may grieve the Holy 
Spirit, and provoke the Lord to leave them to them- 
selves, — which is, indeed, to leave them to Satan, — is 
the main object of the malignant adversary. 

It is not now with the Church as of old, when men 
might also watch for the visible ministry of angels, as 
at the pool of Bethesda, " where an Angel went down at 
a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water : 
whosoever then first after the troubling of the water 
stepped in, was made whole of whatsoever disease he 



292 



CONCLUSION. 



had." John v. 4. Whatever deeds of mercy these min- 
istering spirits may be commissioned to perform, they are 
hidden from our eyes ; but this we know, that daily, 
hourly proofs of our heavenly Father's care over His 
poor children, are afforded to every one of us ; and to 
watch them is a delightful occupation no less than a 
duty. How can we give thanks even for the small pro- 
portion of these mercies that come under our immediate 
sight, unless we watch for, and note them? We may 
be assured that there never is a moment when Satan, 
succeeding as he so frequently does, in drawing us off 
from the straight path of holy obedience into some sinful 
compliance, some unholy word, or evil thought, would 
not gladly cut short at that instant of time our mortal 
life, in the hope of gathering our souls with the ungodly. 
Our preservation in being is an amazing miracle : dan- 
gers surround us on every side ; the food we eat, the 
air we breathe, is pregnant with death. Some deliver- 
ances are so very marked and conspicuous, that we are 
forced to see and to record them : but inconceivably 
greater are those which are warded off by invisible 
agency. Surely it becomes us to observe these things, 
and audibly to acknowledge them. 

In the service of our Church we are taught to unite 
in a form of open confession of sin ; and if we could 
call to mind in how many instances the devil has pre- 
vailed to tempt us into evil during the past week, how 
often we have swerved from the right path, and " erred 
and strayed from God's ways like lost sheep," surely 
we should desire to make our deep contrition known in 



" WATCH." 



293 



the presence, not only of the Lord our God, but also of 
his enemies who have thus drawn us into rebellion, and 
of the holy angels who have witnessed, alike our pre- 
sumptuous transgression and His sparing mercy. — 
There is nothing in this approaching to the blasphemous 
tenets of Rome, by which the angels are so brought for- 
ward as to intrench upon the prerogatives, to usurp, as 
it were, the attributes of the Most High. It is not to be 
for a moment supposed that they can read our thoughts, 
or know more of our secret characters than the Lord 
may see good to reveal to them, as he represents him- 
self to do in the parables of the sheep and the piece of 
money ; where friends and neighbours are summoned 
first to hear of the recovery of what was lost, and then 
to rejoice that it is found. " Likewise," continues our 
Lord, " I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of 
the angels of God, over one sinner that repenteth." 
Luke xv. 10. But those among the ministering spirits 
who are especially placed about ourselves, as we know 
them to be, certainly are at least as well aware of our 
words and actions as any fellow mortal. Our open sins 
are committed in their presence ; but if they know no 
more of our contrite sorrow than usually appears in the 
aspect of a congregation when whispering their con- 
fession of those sins to God in public worship, marvel- 
lous indeed must it be in their sight that we should so 
harden our faces ! 

In like manner, our public thanksgiving — how cold 
a return must we feel it to be, even when our hearts are 
warmest, could we but fairly estimate the amount of 
25* 



294 



CONCLUSION. 



loving-kindness expended upon us during the lapse of 
the few days since our last assembling together " to 
render thanks for the great benefits that we have re- 
ceived at his hands." We are the only oblivious par- 
ties : the devils do not forget how often they have been 
repulsed, and their best laid plans baffled when they 
thought to harm us ; nor do the holy angels forget the 
errands of mercy on which they have sped to our suc- 
cour, help and comfort. Strange must it be to them, 
when, laden as we are with such incalculable benefits, 
and met together to unite in proclaiming them, 

Hosannas falter on our tongues, 
And our devotion dies. 

Yet what are these interpositions of Providence in 
guarding our daily path compared with the interposition 
of redeeming Love, which snatched our souls out of the 
jaws of destruction, translated us from the power of 
Satan to the kingdom of God, and secured to us an in- 
heritance among the saints in light ! We utter the 
name that is above every name, and angels rejoice, and 
devils shrink. We speak of the mystery of his holy in- 
carnation, and the song of Bethlehem is ready again to 
burst forth from the lips of the heavenly host ; we re- 
mind him of his fasting and temptation, and they whose 
infernal leader was vanquished in that awful field, are 
ready again to yell out, " We know thee who thou art, 
the Holy One of God." We talk, alas ! with what un- 
moved faces and feelings ! of his agony and bloody 
sweat, his cross and passion, his death and burial, and 



" WATCH." 



295 



they who witnessed the anguish endured for us are 
present to mark the expression of self-abasement and 
heart-broken penitence of the rebels for whose ransom 
the Lord of glory stooped so low. We name his resur- 
rection and ascension — can we name them coldly, see- 
ing that when He arose from the dead He led captivity 
captive, and received gifts for men, even for the rebel- 
lious, even for us, that God might dwell among us 1 
Surely it would somewhat quicken us at least to greater 
reverence of deportment, greater animation and devo- 
tion, to consider what witnesses are among us, and to 
what they have been witnesses, from the creation of 
the world to this day. 

Yet it is a small matter to be judged of man's or of 
angels' judgment ; he that judgeth is the Lord. If 
He be for us, it matters not who else is for, or who may 
be against us. Angels, principalities, powers, are no- 
thing : we need not to conciliate the favour of the good, 
nor to deprecate the malice of the evil legions, for He 
whose we are, and whom we serve, is King and God 
over all. He bids us watch ; he tells us to gird our 
loins and to trim our lamps, not as trembling slaves, who 
dread the approach of a severe master, but as honoured 
guests, expecting the Bridegroom's coming, that we 
may rejoicingly partake in the marriage festivities. His 
bride is now a mourning widow ; he calls her as a wo- 
man forsaken, and grieved in spirit, for the enemies of 
her absent Lord have usurped his dominion, and dark- 
ened the earth with heathenism, and polluted it with 
blood ; and in the place where she should sit, a shame- 



296 



CONCLUSION. 



less harlot assumes her name, and brands it with the in- 
famy of her own crimes. Well may the Lamb's wife, 
bewailing the desolation of His heritage, stand on her 
tower, and watch for his coming, whose right it is. 
Then shall ensue the universal reconciliation of all that 
God made to harmonize together, and which Satan pre- 
vailed to disorganize ; then shall the tabernacle of God 
be with man, and He will dwell among us who is the 
author, not of confusion, but of peace. Then " the king- 
dom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom 
under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of 
the saints of the Most High ; whose kingdom is an ever- 
lasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey 
him." Dan. vii. 27. Whatever sin has displaced, shall 
again fall sweetly into its assigned station : Man shall 
be a merciful, a loving ruler over the inferior creatures, 
who in their turns shall cease to prey, the strong upon 
the weak ; and he shall again enjoy unrestrained com- 
munion with those heavenly beings between whom and 
himself sin has placed a gulf that neither can pass, ex- 
cept the Lord bridge it over for them. When all things 
that offend and that do iniquity are gathered out, when 
the mother of harlots is hurled from her proud seat, 
where she sits a queen, and now boasts that she is no 
widow, and shall see no sorrow, and has received her 
appointed portion, her plagues of death, and mourning, 
and famine, and utter burning with fire, all coming upon 
her in one day, then, and not till then, shall the night 
watch of the Church give place to the glories of a day 
that knows no going down of the sun. 



" WATCH." 



297 



That this time is not now far off, we have abundant 
proof in the signs that thicken around us. The period 
that remains is but as an hour, and surely we may 
watch with the Lord that one hour. All the malignity 
of Satan that raged against our Master on the fearful 
night of Gethsemane will now be stirred up for a last 
effort against his Church : and the trial will be severe, 
the conflict terrible, even as the issue will certainly be 
gloriously triumphant. Whatever glimpses we may 
have caught of the world of spirits in the course of this 
inquiry, must be turned to good account ; for we shall 
soon need to exercise judgment in the discerning of 
spirits. The sixth vial, under which there can be no 
doubt that we now live, is marked by the going forth 
of the three unclean devils, of whose miracle-working 
power we are forewarned ; and He who has deigned to 
show us things to come, has not set forth cunningly- 
devised fables to amuse our fancy, but revealed solemn 
truths to guide our steps aright, when our path becomes 
perplexed beyond all that we have known hitherto, or 
that the experience of the Church has recorded. He 
that is born after the flesh always persecutes him that 
is born after the Spirit ; but now we shall have the au- 
thor of all corruption of the flesh persecuting the Lord 
in His members ; and we shall do well to measure, so 
far as we can, the extent of that power which is coming 
against us, that we may not only be the better prepared 
to withstand in the evil day, but also the better able 
to magnify the glorious might of Him, who, having him- 
self led the way, has given his poor followers a commis- 



298 



CONCLUSION. 



sion to trample under foot all the power of the enemy. 
How needful, therefore, how precious, are the admoni- 
tions of Scripture 1 " Watch and pray." " Be ye also 
patient ; stablish your hearts, for the coming of the 
Lord draweth nigh." 



THE END. 



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